


SCOTLAND'S SHARE 

IN 

CIVILIZING THE WORLD, 





MACKENZIE. 



MMMMWMM 

mtmtumHmmmm 



2"d COPY^ 
^898. 




LIBRARY^F CONGRESS. 

Chap. Copyright Xo. 

Shelf. ^^ ^''^ 

_z;:.M3 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



^^^16 1899 



SPECIMENS OF PRESS NOTICES. 



(Hamilton Spectator, May 6, 1894.) 

"THE SCOTCH LEAD THE WORLD." 

" Rev. W. J. Mackenzie, Canon of Christ's Church Cathedral and 

Rector of Chippawa lectured last night in the basement of St. Peter's 

Church on the subject of Scotland and her share in the civilization of 

the world. In spite of the heavy rain the reverend gentleman had a fair 

audience, and it was a very appreciative one. Bishop Hamilton occupied 

the chair. 

* 
" Canon Mackenzie held a brief for Scotland and Scotchmen. When he 

had finished the audience were left in a state of uncertainty as to 
whether anything worth doing had ever been done in the world by any 
one who was not a Scotchman. The reverend lecturer showed and 
backed up every claim with authorities— that almost all the modern 
inventions in machinery and applied science which have revolutionized 
the industrial world, annihilated distance, and done so much to advance 
civilization, are products of Scotch genius. Among these are the steam= 
engine, the locomotive, the steamship, the balloon, the application of 
electricity to human uses, the discovery of chloroform, the invention of 
cradling machinery for cutting grain, the reaping machine, and many 
more. He also dwelt eloquently upon the prowess of Scotch upon the 
field of battle, and showed what immense service they had done in ex- 
tending and maintaining the empire. The names of eminent British 
statesmen were mentioned, and a surprising number of the greatest 
of them were those of men born north of the Tweed. The contributions 
of Scotchmen to the philosophy, history, art, and commerce of the world 
was also touched upon. Canon Mackenzie claimed that in the field of lyric 
poetry the Scotch stood pre=eminent among the nations of the earth. He 
had with him a large number of specimen songs, but did not read them be- 
cause it was ten o'clock before he had reached that phase of his subject 
The lecture was not only full of interesting facts, but was also made enter- 



taining by a continuous play of wit and many touches of sly humour. 
Canon Mackenzie made out a great case for his country. 

" In conveying the thanks of the audience to the reverend gentleman 
Bishop Hamilton remarked that to judge from the lecture it was evident 
that the Scotch had done well by the world, and Canon Mackenzie had 
done well by the Scotch." 



(Niagara Falls Record, April 16, 1896.) 

"An open meeting of the local camp of the Sons of Scotland was held 
on Friday evening last for the purpose of listening to a lecture by the 
Rev. Canon Mackenzie, of Chippawa, on ' Scotland and her share in 
enlightening and civilizing the world.' Those who braved the elements on 
that stormy evening were amply repaid for their hardihood in so doing for 
the reverend gentleman's exhaustive lecture proved a treat indeed, and was 
equally enjoyed by the Sons of Scotland and those friends who had been 
invited to be present. 

"In his introductory remarks he reminded his hearers that he did not 
wish to claim everything for Scotchmen, as in his lecture on England and 
Ireland he had done ample justice to those nationalities, in fact, had 
been almost accused of ' claiming everything in sight ' for them. 

" The Canon's description of the emblems of Scotland— the Unicorn and 
Thistle — and his application of their peculiarities to the national character 
was very beautiful. The lecturer's allusion to the foremost place taken by 
Scotchmen in science, arts, literature, war, in fact in every walk of life, was 
highly complimentary to national character for intelligence, shrewdness, 
indomitable pluck, and hard=headed perseverance. The whole lecture 
evinced an immense amount of research; every statement was backed by 
incontrovertable evidence. At the conclusion a hearty vote of thanks was 
proffered to Rev. Mr. Mackenzie for his very instructive lecture, and a 
unanimous wish that the lecture might be printed, as it was considered 
that it would be a valuable addition to Scottish literature." 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE 



IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Rev. Canon^ Mackenzie 

A II 



I mind it weel in early date, 
When I was beardless, young, and blate, 
E'en then a wish — I mind its power — 
A wish that to my latest hour 

Shall strongly heave my breast. 
That I, for puir auld Scotland's sake, 
Some usefu' plan or book, could make. 

Or sing a sang at least. 

— Burns. 




Chicago : New .York : Toronto 

Fleming H. Revell Company 
1899 



->/ 



25257 

Copyrighted iSgg, hy Fleming H. Re-vell Company 







HE LIBtitf I 



mtitmi^Q^^tcy 



\^\o'^^ 



^M n Qi 



PREFACE. 

This lecture was not originally intended for the 
press, much less for a book. It was intended merely 
for an ephemeral "rough and ready" story of Scot- 
land's contributions to the world's welfare, and to be 
told at a Scottish society's evening entertainment. As 
years have passed since it was first told, the story has 
been gradually lengthening by adding new events up 
to date, yet retaining its original simple and una- 
dorned style. It has been told to several Scottish 
Societies — Caledonian, St. Andrew's, Sons of Scot- 
land, and Gaelic — without charge; and numerous re- 
quests have been made to have it printed for the 
honour of Scotland. It is a wonderful story, but its 
sensationalism or eloquence consists only in stubborn 
facts, supported by authorities considered to be reli- 
able. It was first delivered before the St. Andrew's 
Society, Cobourg, Ontario; and lest, from its some- 
what ambitious title and corresponding facts, it might 
seem that I was claiming too much for Scotland, I 
endeavored to do justice to both Ireland and England, 
by delineating in the same lecture, their respective 
national characteristics, and showing the share which 
each of these nations has had in advancing the world's 
moral and physical welfare. 

Being accustomed, as a preacher, to having a text 
from which to speak, I selected as my text the British 

7- • • ' 



8 PREFACE 

Coat of Arms — the Harp and Shamrock for Ireland, 
the Lion and Rose for England, and the Unicorn and 
Thistle for Scotland; and I found to my surprise that 
these various national emblems had a wonderful 
adaptation to exjjress the character, the history, and 
the influence of the nations they severally represent. 
But as time passed the one lecture grew into three. 

The lecture on Ireland I have read both in public 
and in private to intelligent and patriotic Irishmen, 
and have requested them to tell me critically and im- 
partially what they thought of it. Their reply in 
every instance amounts to this — I have done justice 
to Ireland. 

The lecture on England I have not yet read to Eng- 
lishmen; but I am positive that a hearing of it might 
lead to the opinion that I was giving to the Lion of 
England far more of the good things than the Lion's 
fair share; or as some witty newspaper man said of my 
lecture on Scotland, " I claim for England everything 
in sight." I have given to England due credit for 
her achievements in the arts of peace and war. I 
have noted with admiration her poets, and prose 
writers, her scientists, inventors, painters, architects, 
sculptors, and her vast industries in iron, steel, and 
clay; her world=wide commerce, her far=reaching 
Christian missionary operations, and her innumerable 
benevolent institutions at home. But great and in- 
creasingly great though England's enlightening and 
civilizing influence be, there are some things which 
she claims, or seems to claim, which patriotic Scotch 
folk cannot grant her. What these things are can 
only be briefly mentioned. We cannot allow her to 
speak of and virtually claim everything great and 



PREFACE 9 

good pertaining to Britain, as if it were merely Eng- 
lish. Hence we protest with increasing indignation 
against her speaking of the English army, the English 
navy, the English Parliament, the English govern- 
ment, the English flag, the English crown, and of 
braid Scotland as if it were only a part of England. 
Who does not know that such talk is contrary to the 
Articles of Union of the two Kingdoms in 1707, in 
which it was expressly stipulated that thenceforth 
England and Scotland united should be known and 
named Great Britain; and therefore while the Union 
lasts there can be no such thing in existence as an 
English army, navy, parliament, crown, or flag. With 
equal propriety we might speak of the Scotch army, 
navy, jjarliament, crown, and flag; which kind of talk 
would of course be scouted as ridiculous. This 
lecture is intended to show, that many if not most of 
the great discoveries in science and inventions in 
art, resulting in modern civilization, are due to 
Scottish genius, industry, and perseverance. Such 
things ought to be called British instead of Scotch, 
and would be so called were it not so common for the 
English and other nations to ascribe them simply to 
England. 



Very few people know to what extent the civilized world is 
indebted to Scotland for all that we include in the term civiliza- 
tion. A glance at the content. s and press nolices of this i>ul)li- 
cation may alTord some idea of Scotland's share in promoting 
the world's welfare; and that far more can be said to her credit 
than is usually ascribed to her in Scottish literature, or men- 
tioned in apeeohea at the anniversary meetings of Scottish socie- 
ties. As the work was too large to be all given as a public lec- 
ture, only about a third of it has been used for that purpose. 



CONTENTS. 



FAOE. 

Preface — JuHtioc alrondy done, by the author, to 
Englund'H mid Irch'iid'H Hharc in tho worhl'H «nli(^htoii- 
iiioiit and civiliziitioii. Home thin^H whicli cannot bo 
conceded to England 11 — 13 

CHAPTER I. 
Scotland's C/jarac^er represented by the Unicorn. . . 15 — 20 

CHAPTER II. 
ScotlarnVs character reprenented by tho ThiHtle. . . 21 — 26 

CHAPTER III. 

Hcotchmen apt to claim Homo great porHonagea who 
cannot {>roi)erly be called H(!otch. Three exce[)tionH — 
Gordon, Lord Kelvin, and OladHtone 27 — 83 

CHAPTER IV. 

Scotch Inventions, DiscoverieH, and ImprovementH. — In 
Agriculture. Drainage of arable land. FirHt Hcientifio 
plow. The cultivator. Double furrow plow. The 
grubber. Tho iirHt wteam plow. 'I'he odometer for 
sowing. The cradle H(!yth(!. 'J'he firHt reaf)ing ma- 
chine. I'lie firnt thruHliing machine. McrAtlfunizcd and 
Telfordized roadH. 'J'lie iirHt agricultural Hocicty. Tho 
firHt flax mill; and Hteam rcjtting flax. The firnt huc- 
coHHful milking machine. The IirHt ice=making ma- 
chine; and a device for Having lif«^ wh(;n ice Itreakn in 
Hkating or curling. Invention t(f tho Ijife Having Drill. 

Horticulture. — The firHt great Scientific WorkH on 
tho Hubject. 

Veterinary Schools and Colleges. — Rcotland'n Hhare in 
them. Tho IirHt horHOHhoe with Hcrew cogH for icy 
roadn. The nailloHH liorHOHhoe. 

Medical Science.- -¥\rHt poi)ular work on the Hubjcct. 
Great PhyHicianH and AnatomiHtH. Tho uho of Chloro- 
form in Hurgery 84 — 46 



CHAPTER V. 

Age of Iron and Steam, — First Fan Blast. First Hot 
Blast. Stoam Hammer. The Safety Foundry Ladle. 
Various improvements in Steamship Machinery. Scot- 
land's share in Bessmcr's process in making steel. 

Chemistry. — Latent Heat. Kadiant Heat. Specific 
Heat. Nitrogen Gas. Chloride of Lime. Mcintosh 
Cloth, Carbonic Acid Gas. Artificial Stone. 

Civil Emjineering. — .Vlmost all the great modern 
Canals, bridges and docks in Great Britain designed 
and constructed by Scotcli civil engineers: Telft)rd and 
Rennie. Blaekfriars' Bridge by Milne. The Canadian 
Pacific Railway. The Sault Ste. Marie Canal, with 
locks first operated by electricity. The Great Eastern. . 47—54 



CHAPTER VI. 

The Steam Engine. — What James Watt did to make 
it what it is. Various improvements by Watt. The 
Copying Press, Photography, &c. 

The Locomotive Engine. — The first one in design 
and model. 

Light. — Gas Light. The Drummond, Lime, or Cal- 
cium Light. The Heliostat. Biographic sketch of 
William Murdoch 65—63 



CHAPTER VIL 

The Steamboat. — Various claimants. Scotland's 
share. Fulton a Scot. Clyde4)uilt Ships. The Float- 
ing Graving Dock. The Screw Propellor. The Centre 
Board. The first Steamer to cross the Atlantic by 
steam power alone. The owners of the great Trans» 
Atlantic Steamers. Scotch Engineers. 

Steam Derrick and Steam Crane. 

New York Elevated Railroads 64—74 



CHAPTER VIIL 

Baloons, and first ascension in one. The Kite in 
Science. 

The Bicycle and Tricycle, and Pneumatic Tire. 
Bicycle Skate. New Wheel. 

Geology. — The Great Geologists of our day. Edin- 
burgh the birth. phxce of Geology as a Science, and of 
Practical Chemistry 75 — 84 



CHAPTER IX. 

Military Affairs. — Scotch bravery and achieve- 
ments in war. The Bagpipe. Barracks Libraries. 
Percussion Caps. Safety Gun^Carriagc. Heiiry»Mar- 
tini Rifles. Lee=Eiitield and Lce=Metford rifles, and 
Straight Pull. Lord Dundonald 85—95 

CHAPTER X. 

Stereotype. Raised Type for the Blind. Arithmet- 
ical Board for the Blind. Postage Stamps. First Cir- 
culating Library. 

Societies. — Mechanic's Institutes. Freemasonry. 
British Women's Temperance Association. Young 
Men's Christian Association. City Missions. Boys' 
Brigades. Fire Brigades. 

Watches. Kaleidescope. Stereoscope 96 — 107 

CHAPTER XL 

Electricity. — The so'called Voltaic Pile. The Electric 
Telegraph. The Electric Light. The first Sub-Marine 
and Wireless Telegraph 108—118 

CHAPTER XIL 

The Cable King. The Earth Current. Electro Mag- 
netic Clock. The Electric Telephone. The first Elec- 
tric Locomotive. The Air Motor. Proposed Electric 
Cable between Canada and Australia 119 — 126 

CHAPTER XIL 

Scotch Physique and Oatmeal. — Superior average 
weight and height of the Scotch body, and weight of 
brain, compared with those of other nationalities. 
Sucessful competition in athletic games. 

Scotch intellectual and moral character due to the 
Christian Religion. John Knox and the Reformation. 
His Parish Schools. 

Scotch Missionary Societies and Bible Society. 

Education. — Lancasterian Schools. Normal Schools. 
London University. The Royal Society. The British 
Association for the Advancement of Science. The 
Modern Newspaper. Scotch Metaphysics and Meta- 
physicians. Practical Mathematics. Logarithms. 
Astronomy. Sun Spots. The Reflecting Telescope. 
Champion draught player and chess player 127 — 139 



CHAPTER XIV. 

The Fi)ir ^ W.s.— Folk Sonps of Sootlnnd. Scotch Mu- 
8IC. Scotch Words. The Scotch Voice. Scotch Poets 
and Swatch of tlio iinnu-8 of tlu-ir SoiiRS. Powerful in- 
niioncc of Scotch Hoiijjniid music on other nationalities. 
Scotch Hynm Writorn, Painters, Sculptors, Architects. 
Botany made a Science. Zoology. Ornithology. . . UO— 160 

CHAPTER XV. 

Textile Manufactures, and inventions for them. New 
Artilicial Silk. 

Travellers, Explorers, and their discoveries. 

Scotch temperance and generosity 161 174 

CHAPTER XVI. 

Scotland revered and honoured abroad. — In Russia, 
Turkey, India, Canada, China, England, Ireland, and 
United States. Savings Bunks, Bank of England, 
Scotch Banking. 

Her Love of Liberty 175—190 



PICTORIAL ILLUSTRATIONS. 

The Unicorn. The Thistle and Motto. Highlanders and Gen- 
eral Gordon's Monument. Lord Kelvin. Watt's Model of the 
Locomotive. The Royal Willian\ Steamer. Lord Dundonnld. 
David Nasniyth. Robert Burns. Duke of Argyle. Sir W'alter 
Scott. Thomas Oarlyle. Robert Louis Stevenson. Andrew 
Carnegie. John Knox. Sir John Pender, "The Cable King." 



CHAPTER I. 

Let tm now turn to dvnr mild Scotland, and find 
out liow hIh^ compares with Inland and Kn^land, an 
well aH with otluu- nfdioiiH, iti (uili^lit(!ninj^ and civi- 
lizing the world. ScoilaiHrH ('inl)l(!niH arc tins Utn- 
corn and the TluKtle: in tlx^Hc wo may read her 
character. 




THE UNICORN. 



The Unicorn! A Ix'autil'ul creature: but, as rep 
resented in our national arms, only a creature of 

15 



16 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

hornldic imn^ination. It looks like a beautiful blood 
horse; with threo poculinritios, — a spiral, sharp= 
pointed horn ou its forehead; deer's feet; and a 
mule's tail. He must have been a {j^enius who first 
desisjfued and sketched this iitjure, as an emblem of 
our national character. Look at it! A horse, fa- 
mous for its sagacity, its patient industry, its versatil- 
ity in usefulnes, its strength, its terrible courage when 
roused to self defence. The horse is naturally a 
kindly, gentle animal, with a considerable spice of 
pride about him. He evidently thinks himself, and 
not without cause, quite superior to other animals of 
the field. He earns an honest livelihood in many de- 
partments of life. He drags a cart or waggon ; carries 
an emperor on his back; rushes into the thickest of 
the battle in times of war; files like the wind in a race; 
walks with the greatest gravity at a funeral; works 
round and round with patience and perseverance at a 
gin; and so forth. He has evidently a great capacity 
for gocxl, practical work. The world is much indebted 
to him for its prosperity and comfort, and could 
scarcely get along without him. 

It must be evidiMit also that the ITnicorn, having 
so much the nature of the horse, must be decidedly 
fond of oafs, — a taste which we can at once recognize 
as peculiarly Scotch. 

But further, the Unicorn has the (l('Ci'''s foot. 
This suggests an ardent love of liberty. It speaks of 
wild glens and mountains, where freedom is cher- 
ished and maintained, and revels unrestrained by the 
narrow and cruel bounds of human tyranny. 

The l"^nicorn derives its name from that single, 
spiral, sJiarp pointed horn, so prominent on its fore- 



SCOTLAND'S SIIARIC IN CIVILIZING TllK WORLD 17 

head. Mark it, well; ilic liorii iH on liin forehead, for 
this is a pcculiaiity of the Unicorn. Now, the horn 
i.s a wi^ll known Scriptural embh'ni of power; and tho 
foreh(^ad is jj;eneral]y taken an the index of intellect. 
What then does this part of our national (unbleni in- 
tend to reiH-eHenty What else but that our national 
character is distinguishtul by sticn^th and acute- 
nesH of int(!llect? 

The Unicorn, so far as we liav(5 yet seen him, is 
exceedinjjfly pU^asin^'. He has a kindly look; an 
open countenance^; a siinph', jj[entl(>, p{n'sua(ial)le 
aspect; and you tliink that you could coax such an 
amiable creatun; to olx^y you in everytliin^. Try 
him. Cajole him, if you can, to do what lie thinks is 
not right. Imijose on him a little: try ^(inth'ness: 
try threaten iiif^:: try physical force. All fails! Ycm 
are surprised tliat a creature; so gc^ntle, so amiable in 
aspect, should \m so wilful, so obstinate, so stubborn! 
You do not perceive that under aiid behind fdl this 
openness, and transparency, and kindliness of nature, 
there hanga (I tail, — a mul<^''s tail, which rcipresents 
something in our national character-. And what is 
it? The true, the genuiin; S(H>t,ch article, is a dod- 
ged, (lou7% unbending will to maintain and to do 
what we consider to be morally right; and that moral 
dourness nothing can overcome but sound sense or 
brute force. But perhaps you prefVir calling it a 
lion's rather than a mule's tail. Be it so. Then it is 
much the same; for it represents a character — " bold 
as a lion," — and which is not accustomed to " turn 
tail" in' lime of dang(!rous duty, or in defence of 
right against might. Keniend)er that Scotland has 
on her golden shield, her red lion rumjmnt, the very 



18 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

color and attitude of which are quite suggestive of 
"resistance unto blood." Heb. xii. 4. 

The Unicorn has quite a sprightly and sportive 
look as compared with the ferocious and growling 
Lion on the other side of the British shield; and in 
this also we read a characteristic of the Scottish peo- 
ple, both Celtic and Sassenach. It was the jocular 
Englishman, the Kev. Sidney Smith, who said, that, 
** It required a surgical operation to get a joke into a 
Scotchman's head." " Of course he means an English 
joke" was the happy remark of another Englishman 
Lord Iddesleigh, when, as Lord Rector, he was ad- 
dressing the professors and students of the University 
of Edinburgh. Smith, however, long after he had 
cracked his celebrated joke about us, made another 
joke of the same kind when paying a visit to Robert 
Chambers of Edinburgh, himself a dry humorist. 
Chambers said to him, "You must have seen that the 
Scotch have a considerable fund of humour." " Oh, 
by all means," replied Smith, "you are immensely 
funny people, but you require some operating upon 
you to let the fun out; and I know of no instrument 
so effectual for that purpose as the corkscrew." Now 
that joke was intended as an amende honorable for 
what he had said before, and it contains an admission 
that the Scotch are, as I think they are, " an im- 
mensely funny people." See their mass of literature 
in prose and poetry! What other nation has so many 
funny songs and other poems, and so many funny 
stories to tell? I cannot understand therefore why a 
popular author and public lecturer, himself a Scot, 
should recently be telling his audiences, that, " Scot- 
land is proverbially a sad nation;" and, in effect that 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 19 

when a Scotchman hears or reads a joke he gravely 
takes it into his serious consideration, and has to cog- 
itate over it for some time to understand its meaning 
I protest against such misrepresentation of Scottish 
intellect and intelligence. There are some jokes 
which no decent intelligent Scotchman can possibly 
laugh at, — they are so silly, or profane, or morally 
impure, that he only treats them with deserved con- 
tempt or pity, and says of them, at least, " there's nae 
fun there." But for a really good joke, no man can 
better appreciate and relish it than a genuine Scot. 
Here is what Dr. Talmage says about it: 

" There is something about the Scotch character, 
whether I meet it in New York, or London, or Perth, 
that thrills me through and through. Perhaps it 
may be because I have such a strong tide of Scotch 
blood in my own arteries. Next to my own beloved 
country give me Scotland for residence and grave. 
The people are in such downright earnest. There is 
such a roar in their mirth, like a tempest in ' The 
Trossachs.' 

" Take a Glasgow audience, and a speaker must 
have his feet well planted on the platform, or he will 
be overmasted by the sympathy of the populace. 
They are not ashamed to cry, with their broad palms 
wiping away the tears, and they make no attemjDt at 
suppression of glee. They do not simper, or snicker, 
or chuckle. Throw a joke into a Scotchman's ear 
and it rolls down to the centre of his diaphragm and 
then spreads out both ways, toward the foot and brow, 
until the emotion becomes volcanic, and from the 
longest hair on the crown of the head to the tip end 
of the nail on the big toe there is paroxysm of each- 



20 SCOTLAND'S SHAh'h: IN CIVILIZING TIIK WOULD 

iniuiiioii. No Imlf ami half about, the Scotch charac- 
ter. What ho hatoH, h(> hai(>s; wliat ho likt\s, hv likely. 
And ho )(>ls y*hi know il ri^ht away." 

The roUowin^, also from an Aniorican source, may 
Ih> comskKmhmI a rojoiiulor to Smith and otluM' jokora 
at Sct)li'h jjfravity: 

" Sh 15 What do they mean by the centre of gravity ? 

His-Tell a joke to a party of Englishmen, and 
that's precisely what you would bo.'' — l\(lc lu'cord. 



CHAPTER 

Our next embloiii in 




THE THI8TLE. 

I once lieard fin Anicricjin orator addi'cKH a Scotch 
au(li(;ii('(', and ^<iv(i tli(!iM a j^icat deal of ci'cdit for 
many p^ood national qualiti(;H, and eHpccially for tlicir 
induHtry, pluck, and success in life, not oidy in tlic 
StatcH, iMit even in Scotland whose W(^ll known crn- 
])l(!ni is tln^ tliiHtIc, indi(;atin;^ ll)(M'('l)y, Ik! said, tins 
sterility of IJKf Sc<)ttiKli Hoil! That Hccnicd to be the 
r;hi()f idea tin; crroncoiiH idea, th(! Kt(Mility of Scot- 
land- whicli our national (!nd)l()in Hu^m^nUA tf) th(! 
American orator. Hut to an intelli^((nt Scotchman 
tlic TlnKtlc hh^pjchIh Honicthinf^ very difT'crciiit and far 
better, lii^lici', and nobler than men; Htcrility. Hut 
hen; W(! can only j^ive th(» ^i'Mcrnl outline of the 
thisthi's (!ud)lcmatic tc/ichin^, juKtlikc; ihc HUj^^cKtive 
" lujadso' a discourHC!," leaving the; particulars to be 
noticed further on, 

21 



22 sC(yrt,AMrs siiAii'it: in riviuziNc, rinc would 

Th(» lirHJ. iliinjj: lluil. iillnu^iH our noiico about tho 
iluKllc is ilH roii^'h, uiicoiilh, and (wou r(>])(^ll(M^t as- 
|)t>cl. It luiH not. t.lu> iimociMit and kindly look of the 
Hlianirock or tho roH(«. It brinth^H like the fretful 
j)orcu|)iiH>. But it ih houc^Ht. The roHO eoncealB the 
thoruH; not ho the tluHtle. Whatever evil there is 
in it or about it, itw ja}^s, itn wornt ftMiturew are all out- 
8i(l(>; HO that, if you have any d(>alin}j;H with it, you 
may know what you nuiy (>xi)e('t. TluTe is no sham 
about it. It Ih in^rfectly hou(\st. And that in Scotch. 

Ah! but when you ^et beiuvdh or innide of tliis 
rouyh, prickly outHid(> of the thintle what do you tind 
within? You lind a soft, couthie, warm heart. But 
th(> thinth^ iH not alwayn nhowin^ its heart like other 
llowern: it in only on HpiH-ial, v(>ry npecial occasions 
it does HO. Antl in thin rt^spect it iH truly Scotch; 
for our Seotcli folkn, especially our Lowland Scotch 
folks, arc not at all (hMuonstrative of their tender 
ntrt>cti<)ns. Tlu>y are shy, in fact unco blate in telling 
tlu>ir religious exiuu'ience, or in i^xpressin^ their 
friendly fiH>linjj;s, however ferviMit. l\>rhapH no other 
ludion on cart h has sui'h a son^ as " Behave yoursel 
before folk." 

But ar(> not tlu> sciitiinenlMl soul stirring sont^H of 
Scotlanil tlu> outward i>xj)r(>ssion of Scotland's warm 
luMirty And do woi Si'otch folksin^ thiMU with ^low- 
iuLi: enthusiasm in tluMr social ^atherin^sy Nae 
doid)t; luie doubt. But tluMi, ye see, the sinu'cr is 
not HUi)poH(>d to 1h> responsible for the sentimentH he 
siniis; tlu»y nuiy or nuiy not be his. And that ex- 
l)lMins why it is that the fi;enuine Lowland Scotch, 
lujth men and women, will readily sin«jj " before folk" 
the most sentinuMdal of sonyfs - songs of love and 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE tN CtVILIZINO THE WOULD 23 

friendship,— unci yet huve an utter repugnance to ox- 
proHsing that love and friendship in conversation, ex- 
cept on v(!ry Hpeciul (jccasions. 

The thistle is a liardy plant. It can gnjw and flour- 
ish in any climate and on any soil where any otlier 
plants can live, and in (;li mates and jjlaccs where 
other plants would pcjrish. The kind of soil is not oi 
much consequence to it, only let it be soil, not bare 
rock. What Dr. Johnson said of tlie Sf'ot<;h who had 
taken possession of a barren tract of land in Arru;rica, 
that, " they would not know it was barren," is true 
of the thistle, and is true to Sfjme extent of sonn; of 
the early Scotch s(;ltlers in this w(;slf!rn world, for 
we have seen some of tlmm who prospered on lands 
that were considered worthless, and on farms frrjm 
which the previous owners (not Scotch) had been 
starved out. The thistle is in fact an extensive land 
proprietor: takes a strf>ng grip of the soil, and is not 
easily ej<jcted. Moreover, being a steady, sturdy, 
solid kind of a plant; having nothing flashy about it, 
like some others that live fast and die early; the 
result is, that, when autumn has come, and th(5 last 
rose of summer and other flowers are faded and gone, 
the thistle can be seen here and there waggirjg its 
pow, and the bees f(jeding on its sweetness. Thus, 
the thistle is an fjmblem of Scotch steadiness, per- 
severance, industry, and success in difficulties where' 
others are apt to fail. 

The thistle is an exceedingly cautious i>lant. It 
surrounds itself with armour. One of its mottofiS is 
" In defence," another is ''Nemo me impune IticfHifU." 
Both of the mottoes are old. They come from a 
rough and fighting age. They have a defiant t^jne, 



24 SCOTLAND'S SIlAtiE IN CIVILlZlNa THE WOULD 

nml jirt> apt to inipnvsH us wilh llu' notion llialihcy 
ftre provocntivo of a quarrel. But if tliorobo wisdom 
ill ilie maxim, " Tii timo of peaei^ [)n>i)aro for war," 
tluMi ilie lliisll(>'s molloi\saro commcjulahle; for tlu>y 
speak iiol of attack or ai^fj^ression, but pimply of de- 
fence. 'iMicy art> cautious t)utlooks for danger, and 
intlicato preparedness to uieet it. Hcotcli folks say 
that **Ni'mo me inipnuv laccssiV menus "Touch me 
if you darc^!" Another very n[)t translation is 
" Dinna mechlle me an I'll no meddle you"; another 
is " I'll tak dunts frno naobody." Lord Shaftesbury, 
the emiiuMit Christian and statesman, on tlu^ occa- 
sion of his l)«>in^ presiMilcvl with lh(> freedom of (ilas- 
gow, in 1871, ^ave an a(hlress alludint? to the ehar- 
aeler of Scotlar.d anil ScotchnuMi, and nnuh> refer- 
once to th(> thistl(>'s motto, anil its suitableness to the 
peopli> who adopted it. Alludiufjf to the possibilities 
of war in which Britain nu,u:ht soon biMiivolved, ho 
saitl, " he could not but feel, amid all the terrible 
threats that wo hear, what danf2:or8 overlmnfjf this our 
country, and y»>t at the sanu^ tinu> lu» was encouraged 
when lu^ thouLiht of the j^rand old Scotch motto 
around th(> Scotch {\\mi\e,* Nemo Die i)npuni' lacvfi' 
si't,^ whii'h nutans, in simple lani^uaLjts this,— 'Just 
you let me alone, for if you don't I will ^We you 
quite as ^ood as you brinjj^.' That, ho owned to be 
the character of Sc(>tchmen and the character of 
Englishmen. Their language was the language of 
defence, and not of aggression." We are glad It) 
think with his Lordship that " this is ntnv the char- 
acter of l^iUgHshmen."' But it was not always si>, ns 
Scotland very well knows. But Scotland has been 
improving English charaeter, and England has been 



SCOTLAND'S SIIAICK IN ClVILlZINd THE WOllLl) 25 

improvinf^ that of Scotiand. TJh; luKt ^n.-at J<;hko;j 
wliich Scotland gav(; to England in tlio improvement 
of charact<T waH ^(ivon on tlif; fif;Id of Han/io^rklHjrn 
wh(;n kirij^ Ilohr^rt iinjc<; of Scollarid, with oO/XXj 
men, met king Edward il. of Enj^land with UX)/XX) 
men in battle array; and the .'JO./XX) tfjraslied, ehaned, 
and utterly routed tlie KXj/XXj, kin^ Kdward a/id all, 
and taught England tiie V>eautiful meaning and prac- 
tical importance of " AV;mo 7m', impune laceHml.''^ 
If caution, pre<;aution, and cannine-HH mean orifj and 
the 8amc thing, then Scotlarid, fjy the thiHtle, has 
eml)laz<'jned cannirunfH on lie-r coat of arrriH, 

The only other emljlematic characterihtic of the 
thiKtle that may be noticed is this: it in an enterprii*- 
ing plant. See it when it IjaH bhx^med, ri|><;ned, 
and fulfilled it« rnifSHion in itH native plac*.*! Th<; 
fir«t C(Ad blastH of apj^roaching winter blow, and the 
thiHtle openH it.s warm, Hoft, generouH he-art, and pro- 
ceefJ« t() prepare itH l^airnn for their proi><;r plac<H in 
the world. It says to them, in effect: "My bainm, 
tliin place in too ^niall for us all, I am Horry to part 
with you, but it maun be. It will be much better 
and happier for uh all. The world Ih wide, and 
plenty of room in it for the prf;Hix;rity of young anrl 
enterjjriHJng thiHtlen, Now that you have \nt<;ii wifely 
nurB*.*d through your babyh^xxl, and well trained 
to be hardy as evr;ry go'xl thiHtle ought to be, 
and you are decently and c<;mforta})ly clad, and sup- 
plied with ample means for travelling, and with a 
p<^jwer of ]f)Cf)m(jtiou surj^asHing aluK^st all other 
plants, the time has come for us t^j i>art. So, fare ye 
well, and take care of yourselves in this big, rough 
world," 



26 SCOTLAND'S SHAliK IN CIVILIZINQ THE WORLD 

Now, this cntorprising, advonturons, exploring 
character of the thistle, and wonderful facility in lo- 
comotion fon^shadow what can bo said of Scotch- 
men. Scotland is too small for them. They are 
readers, thinkers, and inventors, and are well in- 
formed (d)out oiluM' parts of ihe world where intelli- 
gent, industrious, and wellbehaved folk can be of 
more use to themselves and others, than in Scotland. 
And much as they love their native land, and sorry 
though they bo io loavo it, yet, having supplied them- 
selves and the world with the means of speedy news 
and travel, by land and water, which bring foreign 
countries now a days as it were near to Scotland, 
they do not feel so far away from home after all. 



CHAPTER III. 



THE PARTICULARS. 



Having' given out our "heids o' discourso," as we 
have called them, we must now illustrate them with- 
out unduly " enlarging." 

We claim some great men and great invc^ntions. 
But here our national patriotism and vanity must be 
kept in check by strict justice to other nations; not 
claiming as ours what really })elong8 to oth(;rs. 
There are certain great men and great women who, 
by the father's or mother's side, or by some supposed 
Scotch ancestry, more distant, are rvA-konod so far 
Scotch. Such for example were Tom Hood, Alexan- 
der Hamilton, Washington Irving, of the United 
States; Lord Byron, Thomas A. Edison, tluj inventor, 
Talmage, Macaulay, the historian. Sir Isaac Newton 
(see E(Unhur()h Philosophical Journal, No. 3, July, 
1820); John Bunyan, as his descendant, Thomas Bun- 
yan, Chief Warder of the Tower of London maintains 
(see London Daily News, and Pall Mall Gazette 
Oct. 1882); Shakespeare also, as the paper calh;d the 
Highlander makes a fair show of proving (see New 
York Scottish American Journal Sept. 10th, 1875). 
Then there are Eugenie, ex^Empress of France, and 
members of almost all the royal families of Europe, be- 
ing descendants of Mary Queen of Scots, through her 
son James I. of England. Let us give them all up; 

27 



28 SCOTl, AMD'S SHAni>: JM CIVILIZINU TllK WORLD 

WO Imvo no li^lil, to IIkmu; ilu^y nro not pure Scotch; 
tlu'ir host (luiilitioH nniy bo inlioritod from other nn- 
tionH than onrs. B(\si(U>s, wo do not nood thoni; we 
hnv(> (Mi(>iii::li ol" onr own for our present purpose, 

I think, nevertheless, that it is but reasonable that 
wo shonld r(\nanl tlu» eliildreu of Scotch parents, 
thou}2:h notlH)rn in Scotland, as lu^inu: also Scotch, for 
they inherit from their parents, as a rule, the Scottish 
character, which is tlu> sourct>, under (lod, of all that 
is coinmendabIt> in <ho Scottish people. Hail the 
parents Ihhmi French or Dutch, Chint'so or Hottentot, 
the character of the children would not bo Scotch, 
eviMi thonuh born in S(M>tland. Tt is on that account 
that theri> an> at least three nuMi, namely. General 
(lordon.* William (Jladstone, and Lord K(>lvin, whom 
we cannot surrcndiM- to other nationalities, because 
neither they nor their fatlun's ever surrendered them- 
H(»lvt's; but. on the cx)ntrary, ever maintained and 
ch(>risheil their Scottish patriotism, Scottish tratli- 
tions, and Scottish characteristics. 

Althou,ii;h born in Enj^land and of an Eui^lish 
mother. (Seneral Gordon, "Chinese Gordon," was 
every iiuh a Highlander and a Gordon, but w^ith the 
Ot'ltic tir(\ bravery and endurance, sanctiticd, I'ou- 
t rolled, and directed by divint* ^race. His biographers, 
Hake and Craig, thus speak of him: "It will be iu- 
t(M"csting to say sonu^thing of tlu^ family to which lie 
belongs, if only to tracts to tluMr S(»uri't» the ipialities 



' Tjook on this man wlu) uovor feiirod a man 

Or niultitndcs of n»on. And yot hi.s lifo 

Was such a calm amid porpotuiil strife, 

That inly liUo an KiUmi stri>an» it ran: 

Bocauso l»o feared (Kiil. and because that fenr 

Wr8 a child's reverence for ft Father dear." 



SCOTLAND a HI I ARE IN CIVIUZINd TJIJC WOULD 25) 




AT GORDON'S MONUMENT. 
8t, Paul'H Catlicdriil, London, 



80 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

which have contributed to the making of his strange 
and brilliant career. He comes of a race of M^arriors, 
son of Lieut.^General W. H. Gordon, whose grand- 
father, David Gordon, a Highlander and soldier, was 
taken prisoner while serving under Sir John Cope at 
Preston Pans. His son was a soldier in the 72nd 
regiment and other regiments, and was present with 
Wolfe on the plains of Abraham. His three sons 
were soldiers in the British army; the third, William 
Henry, had five sons, three of whom entered the 
army; the youngest was 'Chinese Gordon,' born in 
1830." It is related of him that when on his way in 
the Soudan to Massowa on a swift camel, he seems to 
have made a pun of the word camel, which is the 
Scotch pronunciation of the name Campbell, for on 
his sudden and unexpected arrival at a station he 
explained it by saying: "The Gordons and the 
Camels are of the same race; let them take an idea 
into their heads and nothing will take it out. If my 
camel feels inclined to go in any particular direction, 
there he will go, pull as much as you like." Well, 
whether Gordon intended or not to make a pun, one 
thing is certain, he ascribes to himself the true Gor- 
don nature and character, which was not that of his 
maternal ancestors; " for," say his biographers, 
" his father was every inch a soldier: a man of hon- 
our and strict discipline." " The mother," say the 
the biographers, "came of English merchants who 
presented a marked contrast to the ' Gay Gordons.' " 
The accompanying illlustration, "At Gordon's 
Monument," and the lines are from the London 
"Church Monthly," the lines being the first verse of 
a lengthy fervid elegy in memory of the hero. 



SCOTLAND'S SHARK IN CIVILIZINd TIIK WOIILI) 'M 

Lord Kelvin, IksUiu- known hh Sir Williuni Thom- 
son, ProfoHHor of Natural PliiloHoijhy in (IIuh^ow 
UnivorBity, is the inv(!ntor of the electric apparatus 
of the TraiiH Atlantic^ (yal)le; for wliieh he received 
the honour of kiu^hthood. He is the inventor also 




LOBD KELVIN. 



of numerous other important scientific instruments 
including the comijass and machine for deep sea 
sounding, which has done much for the safety of 
navigation. He has explorcsd and made so many dis- 
coveries in various defjartments of science that his 



82 SCOTLANirS SUA UK IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

brDtlior scioutists i>;tMioi'ally ncccird to him a place 
socoiul only to that of Sir Isaac Newton. Yet with 
all his attainments and honours he is a man of 
unt'(M,ij:n(Hl Iminility and childlike simplicity. In my 
lecture on Ireland I conceded his nationality to that 
country; but Scotch believers in heredity claim him 
as one of tluMuselves; because his parents were 
Scotch Irish, and he was brought to Glasgow ITniver- 
sity when only eight years old, by his father, who 
was one of the Professors. Certainly if Gladstone, 
in acknowledging receipt of a New York author's 
book, could with propriety, say of himself, although 
born in Liverpool and living his life in England. " I 
am a pure Scolclunan:'' and if "Chinese Gordon" 
although born in England, and of an English mother, 
could with propriety yet claim not only the name but 
also the peculiar characteristics of the Scottish clan, 
Gordon; then with equal propriety may we concede 
to Lord Kelvin the claim of Scottish nationality. 

As with personal excellencies of other nations, so 
also with respect to their inventions and discoveries, 
let us bt» just, giving lu>nour to whom lionour is due, 
even when their inventions or discoveries resemble 
ours, anticipate ours, or are contemporaneous with 
them. 

Some years ago we saw a patriotic catechism, 
which was not Scotch, but of another nation, which 
nation we may call Brobdingnag. Tlie catechism 
must have been, we think, intended not for public 
but for private tuition. It was wonilerful for the 
brevity of its (piestions: but far nun-e so for the brev- 
ity of its answers, for each answer consisted only of 
the same one or two words. Let us endeavour to 



SCOTLANrrS SHARK IN ClVILIZlNd TIIIC WO HI. I) .'?» 

iniitato it us far uh iKJKHiblc. \\v\{\ iH u Kp(!c-iinou from 
memory: '*Wlii(Oi imtiori Iihh IIk; Ix.'Ht form of gov- 
ernment in the world V AiiHwcr:' Brolxlin^na^'. 
Which iH the fr(;0Ht nation in tlio worldy Answer: 
Brol)(linfj:nnf^. Wliich is the best educated nation in 
the worhl? Answer: Brobdingnag. 



CHAPTER IV. 

AGRICULTURE. 

Li't US bi'uin with !i,i;ric'uHur(\ 

Who, ill inodtTii iimos, luis u^iveu to tlio ngricultu- 
rnl world the itlcn niid gront ndvantai^e of under= 
ji^roimd draiiiiiii;; not of mere swiimps or low lands, 
but of arable liiyli lantls? It was Mr. James Smith, 
of Deanston, Seotland, in his papers of IS.'iiiand 183G. 

What nation has ^iven to the world the i^reatest 
number and most useful of agricultural implements? 
Scotland. Let us prove it. 

FIRST SCIENTIFIC PLOW. 

James Small, a Scot, uave to farmers the first 
sciiMititic plow by inventing the curved cast iron 
mould board, which was formerly straight, made of 
wooil, and coverinl with a Ihin sheet of iron to keep 
it from wearing. lie made other improvements 
which need not be mentioned. The EncycU>pedia 
Britannica, last edition, sa^s, "Ever since the intro- 
duction of SmalTs improved swing plow, the univer- 
sal belief in Scothuul, and to a consiilerable extent in 
England, has been that this is the best form of the 
implement." Some, however, prefer the wheel plow 
with oi course the curved mould board. 

" Mr. Smith, of Deanston, invents the implement 
31 



SCOTLAND'S sj/ A/:/': IN c/viiJziNd Tiii<: won 1,1) ar, 

wliic-li lu^ ciiIIh ' the lioi'Hc, or ciillivnior,' wlii(tli, fol- 
lowing in lli(! vvakci of IIk! plow, brcakH mid sliiH lln! 
sul)Hoil williotil, \)v\\\^\]\^ it, i,o l,li(5 surface." 

"Mr. Piri(^, an In^cuiionH AlxTdccn inccliatiic, haw 
r(H-(intIy inviuil.cd a '(loiil)I(^ furrow plow,' on ati cn- 
iircly new priticipic, wliirJi Iiiih met, with f^cricral ap- 
l)rov('in('nt, and Iuih already Ixicn ado|)ied l)y all plow- 
rnakcrH. Tliree, liorKcH and one man with thiH j)low 
cnn perform an much work in a. day mh /"oz/y lK)rH08 
and two men with ordinary plows." 

" \ivv. William Fisken, a probationer of the ( !hnrcli 
of Scotland, inv(!nt('(l llKiHtcani plow, and tlu' potato^ 
plant(T." (HcoUi.Hh Amcricon ./oarnfil, h'ehrnary 14, 
WM.) 

"Mr. T(;Tinaid, at, Sliield.s, near Ayr, invented the 
f/riihhrr, n mont, im[)oriant, itnpleKietii, and now of 
^rcfit, notoriety." 

"Mr. Sherilf, f)f WcKt HarriH, has invent,(!(l a ma- 
chine on lli(! prinri[}|(! of llie odom(!t(;r, for Mowing, 
wliicdi re^iKtiirn the Hpacc; it, travfdH ov(!r, and tlnm 
indicatcH th(! rate per acre; at wliieh it is diHtributin^ 
the seed." 

TirE (JUAnLE KCYTIIE. 

"The Cradle Scythe" has ^iven place larf^ely to 
the reaping machitK^, but is still nscid in new setths 
m(^rdH and other places wlier*! th(! reaping macliifi(» is 
not available. Ttlias })('A'1) called the " Ifaifiaidt (Jra- 
dle Scythe." All lionfMir to ITainanIt if Iks 1h; the in- 
ventor. Hut p(;rhapH Scotland has Honujthing to do 
with it ; for w(! find in the Kiliiil)iir(/li, Mfu/fiziiif;, Vol. VT. 
ff)r July 2lHt, and August 18th, 1702, a picture of th<; 
veritaljlo cradle scythe, with each of its parts narn(!d; 



36 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

and a letter from Peter Williamson who claims to 
be its inventor. It is called " Williamson's New Ma- 
chine for the Reaping of Corn." He says distinctly: 
** It is my invention ... it does more and to bet- 
tor purpose, in one day, than six shearers, and can cut 
down nearly a sheaf at one stroke"; and he wishes to 
bring it under the notice of the " Honourable Society 
for the Encouragement of Arts, Sciences, etc.," and 
offers to teach its use. 

THE FIKST REAPING MACHINE. 

Scotland gave the first reaping machine to the 
world. Here we must notice an episode in its his- 
tory. At the Great Exhibition in England, McCor- 
mick and Hussey brought their reaping machines 
from America, and on trial Hussey obtained the prize. 
No Scotch machine was exhibited. But in 1752 
Mr. Slight, Curator of the Highland and Agricultural 
Society, communicated the facts, that Hussey's ma- 
chine was purely a Scotch invention: the invention of 
the Rev. Patrick Bell, parish minister of Carmylie, 
one of whose machines had been working on the farm 
of his brother, and doing good work during the past 
twenty^five years; and that four of these machines 
had been sent over to America. Of course, both 
McCormick and Hussey, whose machines were on the 
same principle as Bell's, were mum as to where they 
had gotten their idea. 

FANNERS. 

Rev. John Arkle. of Hawick invented fanners to 
separate the chaff from the grain. 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 37 

THE FIRST THRASHING MACHINE. 

Scotland gave tlie first thrashing macliine to the 
world. Says the Encyclopedia Britannica: "It is 
now sixty-five years since an ingenius mechanic, An- 
drew Meickle, produced a thrashing machine, so i)er- 
fect that its essential features are retained unaltered 
to the present day." Andrew, I believe, was a civil 
engineer, and belonged to Haddingtonshire; and he 
erected his first thrashing machine, for Mr. Stein at 
Kilbeggie, Clackmananshire. Haydn mentions that 
Michael Menzies, at Edinburgh, invented a machine 
for the same'purpose in 1732; but Meickle's of 1776 is 
that now in general use. 

MACADAMIZED ROADS. 

Scotland gave macadamized roads to the world. 
What a blessing to farmers to get their produce to 
market, as well as to the general public who use 
horses. John Loudon McAdam was born in Scotland 
in 1756 (see Beeton and Chamber's Encyclopedia). 
The other great road=maker was Tom Telford, a 
Dumfriesshire chield, who improved on McAdam's 
plan by placing large stones for the support of the 
"broken metal." But we have more to notice of Tel- 
ford's genius. 

FIRST AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 

Scotland gave the first Agricultural Society to the 
world. Haydn says, " The first society for the pro- 
motion of agriculture in the British Isles, of whose 
history we have any account, was the Society of Im- 
provers of Afjriculture in Scotland, instituted in 



38 SCOTLANDS SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

1723." That was in fact the originator of all Agri- 
cultural Societies, and farmers' institutes, for town- 
ship, county and province, throughout the British 
dominions, if not also for other countries, 

Scotland gave the first flax=mill to the world. Says 
Haydn, " The first flax seed was planted in England 
in A. D., 1533. For many ages the core was sepa- 
rated from the flax, (the bark of the plant,) by the 
hand. A mallet was next used; but the old methods 
of breaking and scutching the flax yielded to a 
water=mill which was invented in Scotland about 
1750." Retting, that is rotting flax by steam, was 
introduced by W. Watt, of Glasgow, in 1852, and 
subsequently modified and improved by J. Buchanan. 

MILKING MACHINE. 

Farmers and dairymen who have many cows find 
the milking process tedious, tiresome and in other 
respects disagreeable. Here is something for their 
benefit. Says the At)icn'c(i)i Agriciiltitn'sf of July, 
1891: " The milking machine invented and patented 
by Wm. Murchland, of Scotland, has been subjected 
to repeated, practical trials and gives promise of be- 
ing a good thing. It is only for large dairies. It 
will soon be introduced into this country." 

"The Toronto ^Fdil cukI Empire for August, 1895, 
has a long article from James Mills, of the Agricul- 
tural College, Guelph, stating that the college has 
one of the Thistle Mechanical Milking Machines, in- 
vented four years ago by Alexander Shields, M. B. C 
M., B. Sc, of Glasgow, Scotland, and manufactured 
there; which is a u:reat success. With it a man and 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 39 

a boy, or even the man alone, can milk twenty=six 
cows in from twenty to twenty^six minutes. 

THE FIRST ARTIFICIAL ICE MACHINE. 

The manufacture of artificial ice for the dairy, for 
the hotel and for domestic use in summer, has be- 
come one of the great industries of our day. In the 
United States alone nearly $10,000,000 is now in- 
vested as cajiital in the manufacture, and the pro- 
duct in 1890 was valued at $4,900,000. Who has 
first had the honour of making a machine for produc- 
ing artificial ice? France claims the honour, because 
M. Carre, in 1857, brought out a fairly workable 
machine, on the absorption system. Then the United 
States claim Mr. D. Livingston Holden (now a man 
advanced in years) as the father of the compression 
system, by which the bulk of artificial ice is made in 
that country. But Scotland anticipated practically 
both of these systems long before France and the 
United States adopted them, as the following may 
show: 

" Dr. Cullen, in 1755, discovered that the evapora- 
tion of water could be facilitated by the removal of 
the pressure of the atmosphere, and that by doing 
this water could be frozen. Nairn, in 1777, discov- 
ered that sulphuric acid would absorb the vapor of 
water if placed in a second vessel separate from that 
containing the water, but connected with it. This 
discovery he put to use in 1810 by constructing an 
apparatus for absorbing the vapor of the water that 
it was desired to cool or freeze. This apparatus 
greatly facilitated the freezing operations of a vacuum 
freezing machine." — Cassier''s Magazine. 



40 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

"Thou " says a recent number of the Scottish Ameri- 
can, " Mr. David Boyle, the inventor of a machine 
for makinc: ice, who died lately at Mobile, Ala., was a 
native of Johnstone, Renfrewshire; born in 1837. 
He made a considerable sum of money by selling ice- 
lemonade. This lead him to devise a machine to 
make ice, by extracting; the heat from the water by 
means of compressed ammonia." 

Scotch folks are fond of sports on the ice — skating, 
shinty and especially the " roarin game" called cnrl- 
in. But the ice is not always to be trusted. The 
same journal tells us that " a life saving board for 
skating ponds" has just been designed and presented 
to the Greenock Police Board by Mr. Robert Davie. 
Its claims are simplicity, efficiency, and cheapness. It 
consists simply of a pine board tifteen feet long, with 
a cross piece of elm six feet in length. The board is 
furnished with rope handles, will support one or two 
persons who go to the rescue, antl the weight of the 
whole thing is about fifty pounds, so that any lad 
could run with it from one place to another. 

LIFE SAVING HONOUR TO A SCOT. 

"The Hon. Sidney Holland, acting president, acted 
as chairman at the annual meeting of the Royal Hu- 
mane Society held in London on the 28th ult. The 
society has maintained its collective energies, and has 
greatly increased in strength, over 70 per cent, having 
been added to the membership roll. The chief aim 
of the society is to teach the best means of saving 
life from drowning. Over 3300 candidates from 
classes in the United Kingdom and the colonies have 
passed the proficiency tests, being awarded certifi- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 41 

cates and medallions, this boiiifj^ an increase of 1200 
dnrinj? the year. Many of these have been instru- 
mental in savin<^ life from drowninj^ and have re- 
ceived the R. H. S. certificate and medal for bravery. 
Six candidates received the awards in 1897. Mr. 
Wm. Nelson, of (xlasgow, the inventor of the life- 
saving drill, was elected vice president as a reward 
for his energies in the past, and he was also awarded 
the honorary certificate and medal of the society, these 
being acceded to unanimously. — Scottish American, 
March 16, 1898. 

HORTICULTURE. 

Scotland has given ta the world perhaps the larg- 
est share of light on the subject of horticulture, 
or gardening. Many writers on this subject might be 
mentioned but let the following suffice: 

Says Chand)er's Encyclopedia of English Litera- 
ture, Vol. II, 697, "John Claudius Loudon ( 178)1- 
1843) stands at the head of all the writers of his 
day upon subjects connected with lujrticulture, and 
of the whole class of industrious compilers. He was 
a native of Oambuslang, in Lanarskshire, and pursu- 
ing in youth the bent of his natural faculties, entered 
life as a landscape gardener, to which profession he 
subsequently added the duties of a farmer. Finally 
he settled in London as a writer on his favourite sub- 
jects. His works were numerous and useful, and 
they form in their entire mass a wonderful monu- 
ment of human industry. His chief productions 
are an Encyclopedia of Gardening in 1822; the 
Greenhouse Companion; and Encyclopedia of Agri- 
culture, 1825; an Encyclopedia of plants, 1829; an 



42 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Encyclopedia of Cottage, Villa, and Farm Architec- 
ture, 1882; and Arboretum Brittanicura, eight vol- 
umes, 1838/' 

VETERINARY COLLEGES. 

What nation had the honour of first giving to 
the world those scientific and humane institutions 
called veterinary schools and colleges? Not Scot- 
land, but France. Germany was the next to possess 
them; then London, England. London secured the 
services of M. St. Bell, a Frenchman, as Professor. 
He died in 1792. The Encyclopedia says, that on St. 
BelPs death, ''John Hunter and Cline recommended 
Coleman and Moorcraft, neither of whom had much 
experience." " This is the parent of other schools in 
Great Britian."' But who was John Hunter? Let the 
Encyclopedia Britannica answer. " John Hunter, 
1728-1793, as a physiologist and surgeon combined, 
unrivaled in the annals of medicine. Born at Long 
Calderwood, in the parish of East Kilbride, Lanark- 
shire. He dissected over 500 different kinds of animals, 
some of them repeatedly. A man of public spirit, 
and generous with his money for every good 
cause. In his lectures, in London, about 1774, on 
the Theory and Practice of Medicine, he had in his 
class such distinguished names in the medical pro- 
fession, as Abernethy, Carlisle, Chevalier, Coleman, 
Astley Cooper, Home, Lynn, and Macartney." So 
valuable were his discoveries in pathology, and his 
improvements in surgery, such as the cutting through 
tendons for the relief of distorted and contracted 
joints, etc., that when he died he was honoured with 
burial in Westminster Abbey. He is thus referred to 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 43 

in EdwarcVs Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 
under the tevm p!iijsiulu(jij. "Mr. Hunter, of whom 
we here present an engraving, was the first in England 
who investigated disease in a strictly philosophic 
method: bringing to bear on it the clear and steady 
lights of anatomy and physiology. He began by 
discarding all the doctrines of the schools, and re- 
sorted at once to nature. Instead of creeping timid- 
ly along the coast of truth, he boldly, launched 
into the great ocean of discovery, steering by the 
polar star of observation, and trusting to the guidance 
of his own genius." 

Such a man must have occupied a high position, 
if not the highest, among those associated with him 
in connection with the London Veterinary College;" 
and it is more than probable that he had much 
to do with establishing it, and in maintaining its 
efficiency while he lived. 

In 1819-20 a veterinary college was established in 
Edinburgh with Mr. Dick as Professor. He had been 
a student of Coleman's — the Coleman whom Hunter 
had taught and recommended in London. Dick 
was a man of great ability and perseverance. He 
died in 1866. He gained the patronage of the High- 
land and Agricultural So(;iety, of Scotland; and dur- 
ing his time the examining board of the college was 
composed of the most distinguished medical men in 
Scotland, such as Goodsir, Syme, Lizars, Ballingal, 
Simpson, and Knox. With such eminent men at 
the head of the institution it is not surprising that 
the Edinburgh Veterinary College rose to a high 
place in veterinary science and practice; students 
who have been licensed by it have carried that 



44 SCOTLAND'S SHAKE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

science and practice over Scotland, and have abol- 
ished the ignorant nostrums and barbarous prac- 
tices of the old farriers, Toronto Veterinary College 
is, I understand, an otfshoot from that of Edinburgh, 
its first professor being from Auld Reikie; and its 
beneficient influence is felt not only over Canada, 
but even in the United States, where some of its stu- 
dents are practicing. 

Who invented the horseshoe with screw cogs for 
frosty weather? Let the following item from a recent 
number of the Scottish American tell: 

CARLYLE AS AN INVENTOE. 

"Among the relics shown in Carl3de's house at 
Chelsea is one which proves that the great writer 
was also a master farrier. The i3roof of this is found 
in a case in the dining=room, which contains a horse- 
shoe with screw cogs for use in frosty weather, 
invented by Carlyle in 1834. It is said that this 
shoe, which was regularly used at Craigenputtock, 
is practically the same as the one now universally 
used, and that the credit of the humane invention 
of the screw cogs, about which veterinary authorities 
and blacksmiths have had many disputes, really be- 
longs to Carlyle." 

THE NAILLESS HORSESHOE. 

And a further Scotch l)oon to the horse is the nail- 
less horseshoe. Says the Scoliish American, August 
17, 1898: 

" One of the most recent novelties, which will, we 
think, be welcomed as a boon to horsekeepers as well 
as the animals under their charge, is a shoe patented 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 45 

by R. M'Dougall, of Wellington street, Glasgow, 
which can be affixed to the hoof without nails. In a 
recent trial of the nailless horseshoes the new inven- 
tion was put to a severe test — the horse on which the 
shoes were fitted being attached to a heavy-laden 
van and worked up steep gradients and on granite= 
paved streets. Notwithstanding this rough work the 
shoes showed no signs of shifting, and were not re- 
moved until worn out. The new shoe obviated all 
risk of pricking or laming by nails, and a slight rasp- 
ing of the hoof is all that is required in attaching it 
to its bed.. 

MEDICAL SCIENCE. 

Scotland has greatly benefited the world by her 
contributions to medical and physiological science. 

In Burns' poem on " Death and Dr. Hornbook," 
mention is made of "Buchan an' ither chaps." . Now, 
who was Buchan? He was a Roxburghshire chield, 
born at Ancrum in 1729, and died in 1805. He wrote 
three medical works, two of which passed three edi- 
tions each; but his popular and famous book on Do- 
mestic Medicine attained a circulation of 80,000 
copies during his lifetime. In one edition of it iDub- 
lishedin Cincinnati, U. S., in 1843, and edited by J. C. 
Norwood, M. D., it is stated that the Domestic Medi- 
cine had by that time, been published in "uj^wards of 
twenty large editions in England; and had been trans- 
lated, by physicians of eminence, in every language of 
modern Europe; and that with a few alterations and 
additions it forms the substance of every work on 
popular medicine which has appeared since the au- 
thor wrote." 



46 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

But Scotland has given the medical profession and 
to " suffering humanity " not a few " ither chaps" for 
whom the world ought to be grateful. But the list of 
such men is too long to particularize any excepting a 
very few. John Hunter's brother, William, was so dis- 
tinguished in his day, that the Encyclopedia Britan- 
nica speaking of him says, he was a "celebrated physi- 
ologist and physician, and the first great teacher of 
anatomy in England." He died in 1783. John be- 
queathed his valuable museum to London; William 
gave his, with 8000 pounds endowment, to Glasgow 
University, and it is known as the Hunterean Museum. 
Dr. James Young Simpson was the discoverer of chlo- 
roform as an anaesthetic agent. " For this triunjjh of 
science he was rewarded with a prize of 2000 francs 
from the Paris Academy of Sciences, and was elected 
member of the learned societies both in England and 
ujjon the continent of Europe." Sir James Wylie was 
physician to Nicholas the late Czar of Russia. Dr. 
Matthew Bailie, the distinguished anatomist and 
physican to George III. His monument is in 
Westminister Abbey. Sir James Clark, jDliysician in 
ordinary to the Queen, who by his writings on med- 
ical subjects and his merits as a skilful physician 
has earned for himself the title of baronet. Many 
other Scotch doctors might be mentioned but let these 
suffice. 



CHAPTER V. 



AGE OF IRON AND STEAM. 

The civilized and a great part of the uncivilized 
world have been living for a good many years past in 
the age of iron and steam: — iron ships, iron cables, 
iron horses, and iron roads and bridges. Let ns see 
what share Scotland has had in bringing about this 
state of things. 

FIRST FAN BLAST. 

Who invented the fan blast for the smelting of iron, 
and forging purposes? It was James Carmichael of 
Dundee, in 1829. In 1818 he invented also an im- 
proved plan for reversing the gear of marine engines 
— " a most splendid invention." 

FIRST HOT BLAST. 

Who invented the hot blast for smelting iron? 
James Beaumor Nelson. 

FIRST STEAM-HAMMER. 

Who invented the steamdiammer, which can come 
down with a stroke of many hundred weight, or with 
one which can only crack an egg-shell without crush- 
ing the egg? It was James Naysmith, an Edinburgh 

47 



48 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

chield. He was the inventor also of the pile-driver, 
the double-face wedge sluice valve, the safety foundry 
ladle, a steam-engine now almost universally employed 
in screw steamships, and a spherical seated safety 
valve. 

CHEMISTEY. 

Says the Bulletin of the American Iron and Steel 
Trade, (1890) "Bessemer, the Englishman, invented 
in 1855 the process which bears his name and is the 
flower of all metallurgical achievements — a share in 
the honour of this invention, however, being fairly 
due to the co-operating genius of Robert F. Mushet, 
also an Englishman, but born of Scotch parentage." 
But we must go back to a chemical discovery which 
led to Bessemer's. Professor Black of Edinburgh 
University, " discovered fixed air or carbonic acid 
gas in marble and other solids, together with a train 
of important consequences. This is the foundation 
of Bessemer's discovery of working iron." 

Black, who was professor of chemistry, also dis- 
covered latent heat and specific heat. These discov- 
eries laid the foundation of James Watt's scientific 
investigations and discoveries in connexion with 
the steam engine. Black was born at Bordeaux, of 
Scotch parents, 1728, and died at Edinburgh 1799. 
He was a true Scot. Watt and Black were unco sib 
at Glasgow college; Watt was also indebted for much 
scientific light to professor Robison. 

Sir John Leslie (1766-1832) professor of mathe- 
matics in Edinburgh University, and a writer on 
various branches of science, was the first to enlighten 
the scientific world on the subject of radiant heat. 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 49 

Who first discovered nitrogen gas? Professor 
Rutherford, of Edinburgh, in 1772. 

Who invented chloride of lime? It was Charles 
Tennant, of Glasgow, thus revolutionizing the whole 
art of bleaching. Mcintosh cloth came from the 
same city. 

A NEW AETIFICIAL STONE. 

" A Scotch firm is manufacturing an artificial stone 
which is said to stand every test and to be impervious 
to all vagaries of the weather. The process is a sim- 
ple one, and the ingredients of the stone, chiefly lime 
and sand, are not expensive commodities, so that it is 
believed that the artificial product will be able to 
compete with the real. The lime and sand, having 
been thoroughly incorporated, are passed into mould- 
ing boxes, which may be of any convenient size or 
shape, and these are placed within the converter. 
Water at high pressure and having a high temper- 
ature is then pumj)ed into the converter to cause the 
necessary chemical union between the lime and sand, 
and the moulding boxes are also submitted to a tem- 
jDcrature of about 400 degrees Fahrenheit by the 
action of superheated steam. In about thirty hours 
the surplus water is run off, but the heat is continued, 
in order to remove moisture from the moulding boxes, 
for another nineteen hours. The boxes are then re- 
moved from the converter and the stone within them 
is practically ready for use. 

" Experiments are now in progress from which it 
is hoped that other products of nature's laboratory, 
such as slate and marble, will presently be successfully 
imitated." N. J. Advertiser, October 12, 1898. 



50 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

As I may now have occasion to refer to Mr. Robert 
McFarlane as an authority on matters scientific, it is 
proper that I should state who he was, for he is now 
dead some years ago. He was a genuine Scot, from 
Rutherglen, near Glasgow, and was for a consider- 
able number of years Editor of the New York Sclen- 
tijic American. As became one in his position he 
was an '* all-round scientist," and withal he was a de- 
voted Christian. Having been long intimate with 
him I asked him, some years ago, to favour me with a 
list of some Scotch inventions, which he readily did. 
To that list I refer with confidence. 

As we have yet to sj)eak of steamboats which re- 
quire harbours and docks, and of locomotive engines 
which require strong bridges to support the ponderous 
weight of engine and train, let us prepare the way for 
the accommodation of these marvels of mechanical 
ingenuity. This requires civil engineering. 

CIVIL ENGINEERING, 

Scotland has produced some of the greatest civil 
engineers which the modern world, at least, has ever 
known. We need only mention the names of three or 
four, and barely mention their works. " William Fair- 
bairn," says Beeton, " was born at Kelso, about 1780. 
He was among the first, if not the very first, to con- 
struct sea=going vessels of iron. He was also con- 
stantly engaged in experimenting on the quality of 
iron, and did much to advance mechanical knowledge 
in the department of engineering." McFarlane says 
that he (Fairbairn) was the real inventor of tubular 
bridges. "Stephenson conceived his idea (of his fa- 
mous Britannia Tubular Bridge) from Sir William 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 51 

Fairbairn's remark, that an iron ship on the crests of 
two waves becomes an absolute tubular girder for the 
time being." (Peter MacQueen, in the Cosmopoli- 
tan, Aug., 1892.) Fairbairn had much to do with 
that bridge. 

Thomas Telford (1757-1834) was born in Eskdale, 
Dumfriesshire; went to London, and after having 
built about forty bridges in different places, he made 
the canals to connect the Severn, the Dee, and the 
Mersey. He made the Caledonia Canal; the Glas- 
gow, Paisley and Androssan; the Macclesfield; the 
Birmingham and Liverpool Junction; and the 
Weaver Navigation in Cheshire, were either entirely 
or partially constructed by him. The Gotha Canal 
in Sweden was his work. He was commissioned to 
make roads and bridges all over Scotland, and to 
build churches and manses in the Highlands. The 
improved road from Holyhead to London; the Menai 
Suspension bridge; the St. Catharine's Docks, Lon- 
don, and the harbour works of Aberdeen and Dundee 
are his. He also was a writer on architecture, civil 
architecture, and inland navigation, and left large 
sums of money for the advancement of science. The 
Encyclopedia Britannica (8th Ed. Diss, vi.) says, 
" Telford, though not the contriver of suspension 
bridges, yet deserves notice from the superior bold- 
ness and solidity of the noblest work of the kind 
which has yet been executed — the Menai bridge." 

John Rennie was a farmer's son; studied under 
Drs. Black and Robison; went to London in 1780; 
built Waterloo bridge over the Thames, and theSouth- 
wark iron bridge over the same river. The Grand 
Western Canal, from the mouth of the Exe to Taun- 



52 SCOTLAXD'S SHARE IX CIVILIZIXG THE WORLD 

ton: the Aberdeen Canal, and the Kennet and Avon 
Canal were his works. He designed the London 
docks, the East and West India Docks in London; 
and those of Greenock, Leith and Liverpool. The 
designs for London bridge were made by him, but 
were carried to completion by his son, Sir John Ren- 
nie, after his death. He also furnished plans for the 
improvement of the dock yards of Portsmouth, Plym- 
outh, Chathan, and Pembroke; erected the pier at 
Holyhead, and designed the enlargements of the har- 
bours of Berwick, Xewhaven, etc. He was born at 
Phantassie, Haddingtonshire, 1761, died in London, 
1821, and was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral. 

John Scott Russel was born in the vale of Clyde 
in 1808, and studied mathematics and the physical 
sciences at Edinburgh and Glasgow, where he grad- 
uated in 1824. Went to London in 1844, where he 
directed his attention to the construction of iron 
vessels. In 1885 he built a ship upon his newly dis- 
covered '• wave iDrinciple ■' which, together with other 
vessels subsequently constructed upon the same 
model, was perfectly successful. His greatest 
achievement, however, was the Great Eastern. He 
was fellow of the Royal Society of London, Secre- 
tary" of the Society of Arts, and was one of the most 
active members of the commission of the great Exhi- 
bition of 1851. In 1837 he received from the Royal 
Society of Edinburgh, of which he was a member, a 
gold medal for his proposed improvements in the 
form of vessels. 

Beeton says, " The first stone of Blackfriars' 
Bridge, London, was laid October 81, 1760, and it was 
completed by Milne, in 1770."' This Milne was a 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 53 

Scot, and of an ancient family of architects of that 
name. The Scoff isJi American Journal, February 3, 
1892, says: " A new book \\\\\ be issued this year on 
the ' Master Masons to the Crown of Scotland ' — a 
book of immense research. Special attention has been 
given to the remarkable career of Robert Milne, the 
architect of Blackfriars' Bridge; and beautiful en- 
gravings are to be given of the medals which were 
presented to him by the two Popes, Clement XIII. 
and Clement XIV. These medals were piously de- 
posited by him in the foundation stone of Black- 
friars' Bridge, and were recently discovered, a cen- 
tury afterward, during the repairing of the structure. 
He was surveyor of St. Paul's Cathedral, London, 
during fifty years; and it was at his suggestion that 
the famous memorial inscription to Sir Christopher 
Wren — Si monumenfnm reqniris circumspice — was 
placed in that structure." Out of sixty-nine f)lans 
presented by candidates for building Blackfriars' 
Bridge his alone was adopted. He was honoured by 
burial in St Paul's, in 1811. 

England has received quite recently another ben- 
efit from Scottish engineering genius in the construc- 
tion of the Manchester canal; for says the Scottish 
American Journal of January 31st ult., " Rothesay is 
proud of the fact that the ince^Dtion of the Manches- 
ter Canal was greatly due to a Rothesay man— Mr. 
George Hicks." 

To record the many triumphs of Scotch civil en- 
gineering throughout the world is more than our space 
and time would permit. Take only one or two ad- 
ditional: the first of which is near home — the Canada 
Pacific Railway, which, considering its extreme 



54 SCOTLAXD'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

length and the formidable obstacles to be overcome, 
is one of the greatest achievements of the engineering 
art the world has yet seen. Who have been the most 
prominent men in its formation? Sir John Mc- 
Donald was its far-seeing and indomitable projector. 
Sanford Fleming its chief engineer, assisted by the 
genius, energy, and courage of William Mackenzie 
and James Ross. The syndicate who, aided by gov- 
ernment, shouldered the enormous financial responsi- 
bility were chiefly such men as George Stephen, 
Duncan Mclntyre, Robert Angus, Sir John Rose, 
and Donald Smith. All Scots, ilka ane o' them. 

Then there is the new Sault St. Marie Canal, re- 
cently opened, having its five gates all worked with 
almost incredible speed by electrical power — the first 
instance of this power being thus used — the whole 
designed by an Aberdeen man, Mr James B. Spencer 
of Ottawa, Chief Draughtsman of the Department of 
Railways and Canals. 

Take one other instance but far away in India. It 
is the largest masonry dam in the world; a stupen- 
dous work of engineering, lately completed by Glover 
and Co. of Edinburgh. It supplies Bombay daily 
with one hundred million gallons of water. 



CHAPTER VI. 



THE STEAM-ENGINE. 



Who gave the first steam=engine to the world? It 
is hard to tell. Long, long ago, 120 B. C, a philoso- 
pher of Alexandria in Egypt named Hero is said to 
have invented a machine consisting of a hollow globe 
from the sides of which projected bent open tubes: 
and that when steam was admitted into the globe its 
action on the tubes caused the globe and tubes to re- 
volve. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, 
a genius of the name of Ramsey (no doubt a Scot) 
at the Court of our James VI. and I. of England, 
seems to have anticipated and patented something 
of the present form and uses of the steam-engine. 
(Brayley and Britton's History of the ancient Palace 
and House of Parliament at Westminister, p. 382. ) 
Then considerably later come other inventors— 
Papin, Savery, Worchester, Newcomen, and Cawley. 
But all the world knows that it was by James Watt, 
a Greenock chield, that the steam=engine was 
brought to its present perfection. His four great in- 
ventions — the separate condenser, the appendages for 
parallel motion, the double acting cylinder, and the 
governor, made the steam-engine what it now is 
capable of spinning the finest thread and of rushing 
along at the rate of seventy miles an hour dragging a 
train of hundreds of tons weight behind it. 

Who gave the first locomotive engine to the world? 

55 



56 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 
THE STEAM LOCOMOTIVE. 

Frenchmen, Americans, and Englishmen all claim 
the honour. In 1769 one, Moore, a linen draper, 
made one; in the same year Cugnot, of Lorraine, 
constructed one; and in 1772 Oliver Evans, an Amer- 
ican, is also credited with the honour. But all these 
are antedated by the design for a steam=carriage, by 
Dr. John Eobison, at the age of twenty=one, which 
he published in the Universal Magazine for Novem- 
ber, 1757. He also, says The Encyclopedia Britan- 
nica, directed Mr. Watt's attention to the steam= 
engine in the same year, with a view to this very ap- 
plication. Watt actually made a model on Robison's 
suggestion. Watt never lost sight of the locomotive, 
although engaged in many other inventions. " In 
Watt's patent of 178-4 the steam-carriage forms the 
seventh article, and in the same year Mr. William 
Murdoch, a member of Boulton and Watt's establish-* 
ment (at Soho), made a model, acting by higli= 
pressure steam, which drove a small waggon round 
the room." This model was exhibited in the Great 
Exhibition at London in 1851. Here I give from 
the lUusfrafed Exhihifoi' a picture of the model, 
and the Exhihito7'''s remarks in connexion: 

" The history of the steam=engine is the history of 
all enterprise and ingenuity for the last seventy years 
and it were as impossible to speak of industrial prog- 
ress without reference to it as it would to describe 
the French Revolution and omit Napoleon. 

"The words of Dr. Darwin were prophetic: 

'Soon shall thy arm, uncouquered steam! afar, 
Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car! ' 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 57 

and it is interesting to compare them with those of 
James Watt, whose fame is limited only by the 
bounds of civilization. ' My attention was first di- 
rected in the year 1759 to the subject of steam- 
engines by the late Dr. Robison, then a student of 
the University of Glasgow, and nearly of my own 
age. He at that time threw out an idea of applying 
the power of the steam=engine to the moving of wheel 
carriages and to other purposes: but the scheme was 
not matured, and was soon abandoned on his going 
abroad.' 




"The visitors of the Exhibition have doubtless 
looked with curiosity on ' The Working Model of a 
Locomotive, made in 1785, by William Murdoch, of 
Soho, Birmingham,' of which we give an engraving. 



68 SCOTLASD'S SHARE IX CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Mr. Murdoch was a man of great ingenuity. Of this 
there is suflBoient proof in his paper in the ' Philo- 
sophical Transactions ' for 1808, on ' The Application 
of Gas from Coal to Economical Purposes,' for which 
the Royal Society presented him with the large 
Rumford gold medal. He had previously proved, for 
many years, a most able and zealous agent in carry- 
ing out the plans of Messrs. Boulton and Watt, in 
the introduction of their engines into Cornwall; and 
afterwards, in the construction and carrying forward 
of their works at Soho. Watt refers, in one of his 
works, to several of Murdoch's very ingenious inven- 
tions, and also to his construction of tools for the 
manufacture of machinery. In these circumstances 
he made the model now referred to, the first locomo- 
tive ever applied to the drawing of carriages, as de- 
scribed in the specification of Watt's patent. ' I in- 
tend, in many cases, said that eminent man, ' to em- 
ploy the expansive power of steam to press on the 
piston. In cases where cold water cannot be had i*i 
plentj% the engines may be wrought by this force of 
steam only, by discharging the steam into the open 
air after it has done its office.' A friend of Mr. J. P. 
Muirhead saw this model drive a small waggon round 
the room in Mr. Murdoch's house at Redruth, at 
Cornwall. 

" In a letter from Dr. William Small to Mr. Watt, 
dated September, 1786, he says: 'Your very clever 
friend, Mr. Robison, and his pupil, passed Friday 
evening with me, to my great satisfaction. I told 
them I hoped soon to travel in a fiery chariot of your 
invention!' The tribute afterwards borne by Watt 
to the chief of these visitors was fully merited: 'It 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZINO THE WOULD 59 

was with great concern I learnt the other day the 
death of my worthy friend, Professor Robison. He 
was a man of the clearest head and the most science 
of anybody I have known, and his friendship for me 
only ended with his life, after having continued 
nearly half a century.' Mr. Muirhead states that 
among the persons who saw this ' working model ' at 
Mr. Murdoch's was Mr. Richard Trevethick, who, in 
1802, took out a patent for an engine to be applied to 
the driving of carriages, using the same principle 
with variations. 

" It is interesting to examine this model, in con- 
nexion with those complex, and, in some instances, 
stupendous machines, of which the Exhibition sup- 
plies so many examj)les. Franklin said of the first 
balloon: 'It is a babe; but it may become a giant.' 
The balloon, however, is a ' babe ' still; while the lo- 
comotive presents to it a most striking contrast; if, 
in this model we have ' the babe,' ' the giant ' is at 
hand inviting our contemplation. But it appears 
that the idea of a rail never entered the mind of 
Watt; all that he seems to have considered was the 
movement of a carriage by steam on ordinary 
roads." 

All honour to Trevethick and Stephenson who, al- 
though neither of them invented the locomotive, yet 
vastly improved it, and put it to practical use. 

James Watt was an inventor of other things besides 
those connected with the engine. He invented the 
copying press; a steam drying machine; a machine 
for coj^ying sculpture; and was an experimenter in 
photography. Two of his pictures of the old Soho 
house, on copper plates, by the old process, are in the 



60 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

patent museum. He also made improvements in 
bleaching, principally derived from the great French 
chemist, Berthollet, which improvements he com- 
municated to Mr. McFarlane's grandfather, a rela- 
tive of Watt's by marriage. 

GAS LIGHT AXD OTHER LIGHTS. 

Who has had the honour of lighting up the civilized 
world with illuminating gas, thereby abolishing the 
old whale oil lamps in city streets and similar 
lamps and tallow dips and snuffers in shops and 
places of public resort? No man has had the honour 
of "inventing" gas, for long before it was applied ex- 
tensively to human use it was kuown as a natural 
product of certain mines and wells; and between the 
3'ears 1658 and 1739, pajjers on the subject were read, 
by men of science, before the Royal Society in Lon- 
don. The Rev. Dr. Clayton, Dean of Kildare, Ireland, 
gave an account of his experiment in the distillation 
of gas from coal, and in 1789 Lord Dundonald used 
it occasionally in lighting up Culross Abbey in Scot- 
land. But gas was regarded mostly as a chemical 
curiosity, and was put to no general practical use 
until the year 1792, when William Murdoch, a Scot, 
a man of many useful inventions, applied his knowl- 
edge of chemistry and practical acquaintance with 
mechanical science to the production of the appara- 
tus required for the distilling and refining of coal gas, 
and its conveyance by pipes for general use in illu- 
mination. For this boon to the world, and for other 
products of his inventive genius, William Murdoch 
ought to be better known to his countrymen. I 
therefore do not hesitate to insert here the following 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 61 

lengthy extract from an American paper to his 
honour: 

MURDOCH AND THE INVENTION OF GAS LIGHTING. 

" ' Ballochmyle,' in the Leeds Mercury, says: The 
recurrence of the 9()th anniversary of the first public 
use of gas coal for lighting purpose (April 29, 1802) 
reminds us that science has its romances no less fasci- 
nating a)id no less renowned than the triumphs and 
failures, the joys and griefs, of human life. It is a 
popular delusion that William Murdoch was the ' in- 
ventor ' of gas for illuminating purposes, but it would 
ill become any one of his countrymen, clansmen or 
descendants to try to minimise the splendour of his 
genius and inventions by which the practical use of 
coal gas as an illuminant was first made possible and 
triumphantly realized. 

" William Murdoch was born near Old Cumnock, 
his father combining the work of a millwright and 
flower miller — a very common form of ' trade union' 
a hundred odd years ago, and not quite extinct in the 
south- west of Scotland even yet. Murdoch, Sr., was 
undoubtedly the inventor of the iron toothed system 
of gearing, and I have seen a wheel of that stamp 
which he not only designed but made by his own 
hands in a neighbouring smithy — a rough but strong 
and thoroughly effective bit of mechanism. Until 
he was over 20 years of age William worked in the 
parental mill, or mills, and it was by his father's ex- 
amjile his mechanical genius was inspired and his eyes 
and hands trained to fashion the realized ideals of 
mechanical invention. For the remaining facts of 
his public career I must have recourse to the admir- 



62 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

able biographical summary which appears in volume 
VII of the 1891 edition of Chamber's Encyclopedia. 

" In 1781 William Murdoch entered the employment 
of Boulton & Watt, Birmingham, and showed such 
marked ability that he was sent to Cornwall to super- 
intend the erection of mining engines there. At 
Redruth he constructed, in 1784, the model of a high- 
pressure engine to run on wheels. Watt showed 
some jealousy at these efforts; but Boulton offered 
him a reward for an engine capable of carrying two 
persons and the driver. His labours in Cornwall 
were arduous, although he had not more than £1 per 
week up till his forty^fourth year, and a request for an 
increase of salary not being promptly acceded to, he 
made \\p his mind to change. The mining com- 
panies, at last realizing the value of his services, of- 
fered him XIOOO pounds a year as chief engineer at 
the mines. But he declined and returned to Boulton 
& Watt, who gave him a like salary as general man- 
ager of Soho Works. Murdoch's inventive brain was 
never idle; he introduced labor-saving machinery, a 
new method of wheel rotation, and an oscillating en- 
gine (1785) of a j)attern still in use. He also im- 
proved Watt's engine; introduced a method of cast- 
ing steam cases for cylinders in one piece, instead of 
in segments; a rotary and compressed air engine; a 
steam gun; cast-iron cement; a method of heating 
by circulating water through pipes; a method of 
sending messages through an exhausted air tube; and 
many other inventions. His investigations in the dis- 
tillation of coal gas began at Redruth in 1792, when 
he lighted his offices and cottages by its agency. He 
publicly showed the results in 1797 and 1798, the 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 63 

premises at Solio being lighted with gas. But he 
did not reap due profit from this useful invention. 
Murdoch read a paper on the 'Economical Use of 
Gas from Coal' before the Royal Society in 1808. 
He died in 1839. 

" There is no doubt that it was Murdoch's invention 
of the hydraulic main, and wetdime purifier, and the 
water meter, that enabled him to apply 'distilled 
coal gas ' to domestic and public lighting jpurposes. 
He lit up his own house with gas at Redruth, when 
he resided in Cornwall (1792), in 1798 he lit up the 
Soho factory of Boulton & Watt at Birmingham, in 
1805 he had a thousand burners ablaze in the cotton 
mill of Messrs. Phillips & Lee at Salford; in 1801 Le 
Bon lighted his house with gas in Paris, and in the 
April of 1802 he had a portion of the public streets 
in Paris illuminated in the same way, and in 1810 
was forming the first Chartered Gas Company, and for 
the first time (1813) Westminster Bridge was lighted 
by gas." 

And who invented the Drummond light, known 
also as the lime or calcium light? It was Captain 
Thomas Henry Drummond, an Edinburgh genius; in- 
ventor also of the heliostat, so useful to surveyors. 

Elecriticity is now taking the place largely of gas 
as an illuminant; but when we come in our story to 
speak of electricity we shall find that Scotchmen have 
been in the very forefront of the world's pioneers in 
electrical science and its practical application to 
human use. 



CHAPTER VII. 



FIRST OCEAN STEAMER. 



Who had the merit of first giving the steamboat to 
the world? Three nations claim the honour. Let us 
give honour to whom honour is due. 

France claims that the Marquis de Jouffroy put a 
steamer on the Doubs in 1776, and more successfully 




THE ROYAL WILLIAM. 



on the Saone in 1783, but failed to carry out the in- 
vention into common use for want of means and sup- 
port. The Academy of Sciences acknowledged his 
claim to the discovery in 1840. 

64 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 65 

Some Americans claim John Fitch, a native of 
Pennsylvania, as the real inventor of the steamboat; 
and that he had one in actual operation on the Dela- 
ware river in 1787, and more successfully in 1788. 
He also failed for want of means and support. 

The Americans also claim Robert Fulton as a na- 
tive of the States and the inventor of the steamer, 
who placed his invention on the Hudson river in 
1807, which was quite a success. They regard him 
as " the father of steam navigation." 

All honour to JouflProy and Fitch. If what be 
said of them be true they deserved better from their 
countrymen and the world. 

But we are not done with Fulton. It is very 
doubtful whether he were a native American. Here 
is what appeared in the Scottish American, Feb- 
ruary 1, 1877. 

A CUEIOUS QUESTION. 

To the Editor of the Scottish American Journal: 

"Dear Sir: — I clip the following from a late num- 
ber of the Philadelphia Presbyterian: — 'John 
Stevenson writes to the Glasgow News that his 
granduncle, Robert Fulton, instead of being born in 
Pennsylvania of Irish parents, as his American biog- 
raphers say, was Scotch, and was born in Beith, in 
Ayrshire. Mr. Stevenson says that in consequence 
of having offered a torpedo invention to the French, 
Fulton concealed the fact of his Scottish origin as 
much as possible, and when last in Scotland only 
visited his relatives by stealth, being afraid that pro- 
ceedings would be taken against him by the British 
Government." 



66 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Fitch's friends maintain that Fulton saw Fitch's 
boat; and the Encyclopedia Britannica says, "he had 
seen the relics, in Scotland, of Symington's last ex- 
periment," so that he could not justly be called the 
inventor. Indeed I have not seen it stated that he 
claimed to be such. His boat was supplied with a 
Boulton and Watt engine. He deserves great credit 
for his pluck, perseverance, and success in introduc- 
ing steam navigation into the States. 

Scotland justly claims the invention of the steam- 
boat, at least equally and independently of both 
France and the United States. "The idea,'''' says the 
Encyclopedia Britannica, "of the application of the 
steam=engine to move ships was already a familiar one 
to the minds of many persons about the middle of 
last century." " The first exiDeriment entitled to be 
called successful was made by Mr. Miller of Dal- 
swinton, in Scotland conjointly with Mr. James Tay- 
lor, tutor in his family, who together formed the pro- 
ject of moving vessels by means of paddle-wheels 
driven by a steam-engine, and realized it with the aid 
of Symington, a practical engineer. Miller had been 
working at the matter before employing Symington, 
how long before we know not. Their first boat was 
put in operation, on Dalswinton Loch, Dumfries- 
shire, in October 1788. The subject was pursued by 
Symington and others. In 1789 a larger vessel was 
propelled on the Forth and Clyde canal. That is 
about eighteen years before Fulton. 

But, says Haydn, " The first idea of steam naviga- 
tion was set forth in a patent obtained by Jonathan 
Hulls in 1736." This is the earliest claim of all; but 
we have never seen any proof that Jonathan's "idea" 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE JN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 67 

ever " materialized " in the form of a steamer. One 
thing is certain that after Symington's successful 
trip on the Forth and Clyde canal the next steamers, 
in Britain, were those that began to ply on the Clyde 
in 1812; and Beeton says that, " the first steam=vessel 
on the Thames was brought by Mr. Dodd from 
Glasgow." 

It need scarcely be noticed that " Clyde-built 
steamers" constructed by such as Najjier, Denny, 
Steele, Scott, Caird, etc., are famous all the world 
over. And not only steamers of the ordinary class, 
as the following item of news intimates, — " Glasgow, 
March 4th, (1892)— Her Majesty's ship Kamalies, the 
largest ironclad in the world, was launched yesterday 
at Thomson's yard, Clydebank." 

FLOATING GKAVING DOCKS. 

Who was the inventor of the floating graving dock? 
Let the following obituary notice tell: 

"Mr. James Taylor, of Birkenhead, who was for 
nearly forty years one of the leading contractors for 
the Admiralty and other Government Departments, 
died on the 12th inst. A native of Glasgow, where 
he was born in 1817, he became connected with Fox, 
Henderson & Company, London and Birmingham, 
and in 1852 established the Britannia Engineering 
Works at Cheadle. He was the inventor of the float- 
ing graving dock, and the inventor and builder of 
some of the largest steam cranes in the kingdom." 
— Scottish American, September, 26th, '94. 

THE SCREW PROPELLER. 

Who was the inventor of the screw propeller for 



68 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

steamers? In The Leisure Hour, London, for 1856, 
p. 532, is an interesting articles entitled. An Accident 
and Hs Results, in which the invention is credited, it 
seems, wholly to Mr. Francis Petti t Smith, a farmer 
of Middlesex, England, in 1836. Now the truth is, as 
shown in the Encylopedia Britannica, that two 
Frenchmen — Bouguer in 1746, and Bernouilli in 
1751 had invented it. When James Watt sent draw- 
ings of his engines to Soho in 1770 for Mr. Boulton 
to construct one for experiment, and had been told 
that it was intended to make an engine to draw canal 
boats. Watt wrote, " Have you ever considered a 
spiral oar for that purpose, or are you for two 
wheels? " and to make his meaning clear he sketched 
a rough but graphic outline of a screw-propeller. 

Then in 1776 James Watt again mentions it, to Dr. 
Small, who replies that he had seen it. J. Stevens in 
1804 was the first in America who tried it with steam, 
which he did at New York. Since the beginning of 
the present century hundreds of patents have been 
taken out for the invention. Mr. Robert Wilson, a 
Scot, was early in the field as a successful experi- 
mentalist with it. He made and exhibited models of 
a vessel propelled by a screw in the years 1821-1825. 
In the year 1827 he brought his scheme before the 
Admiralty; but it was rejected. From 1828 till 1832 
Mr. Wilson brought his invention before various 
public bodies. Small grants were made by the High- 
land Society and the Society of Arts, for testing its 
efiiciency; and its performance in a boat, at Leith, 
under the direction of a committee of the Society of 
Arts, was favourably reported in 1832. Says the 
Encyclopedia : "Mr. Bennett Woodcraft, Mr. Wilson, 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 69 

and others have contributed greatly to the introduc- 
tion of the screw propeller; but Mr. Smith, aided by 
his moneyed associates, was first to put the screw into 
a big ship, and boldly go to sea in her; and the 
world will continue to give him credit for introduc- 
ing the screw propeller into actual use, and some- 
times, but with less justice, for having invented it." 

Who invented the centre board, to make a vessel 
lie near the wind? Benjamin Franklin, who in his 
works, written about 1770, describes it, tells us that 
the inventor was " Mr. W. Brodie, shipmaster in 
Leith." 

FIRST TRANSATLANTIC STEAMER. 

Who first sent a steamer across the Atlantic by the 
power of steam alone? We say by steam power alone, 
because, says The Scientific American, of Dec. 21, 
1895. " To America belongs the glory of building 
the pioneer transatlantic steamship. This was the 
steamer Savannah, built at New York." A jjicture is 
given of this vessel; and behold, it is a three=masted, 
fulhrigged ship, with eleven sails all spread, and 
quite sufficient to joropel the vessel without steam at 
all, and which they actually did during eight days 
out of twenty^six, in the voyage to St. Petersburg in 
1819-1820. Tlie Scientific American has, however, 
the justice to add, that, " Next to the Savannah 
comes the Royal William, which it is said was the 
first sea-going steamer that ever crossed the ocean 
propelled all the way by steam." But why speak of 
it so uncertainly? It is a well=known, historic fact, 
connected with the city of Quebec, as The Scientific 
American has to acknowledge. Here are a few of the 



70 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

facts showing Scotland's share in what our Scientific 
American friend would call " the glory" of it. 

Mr. William Power, of Kingston, Canada, (says 
the Woodstock Times, January 17, 1890) claims that 
he saw, in the course of construction the first steamer 
that ever crossed the Atlantic by steam alone. She 
was built at Quebec. James Gouldie, now of Chica- 
go, was intrusted to carry out the plans of construction 
given him at Greenock. He j)roceeded to Quebec in 
1830, and there built the Royal William, named in 
honor of King William IV. She was launched in 
May 1832, and ran between Quebec and Halifax. 
In August of 1833, she crossed the Atlantic in twenty- 
five days. Mr. Gouldie, the builder, was born at 
Quebec, December 19, 1809. His father was a 
Scotchman; was at that time the most extensive ship 
builder and owner of his day; and dui"ing the wars of 
1813 and 1815, he built in several places, for 
the British Government, quite a number of ves- 
sels of both large and small tonnage." 

Who owns the lines of magnificent steamers that 
ply between Britian, the United States, and Canada? 
Almost, if not all, Scotchmen. The Anchor Line, by 
the Hendersons, of Glasgow. The Allan Line by 
the Canadian Ocean Steam Ship Company, the lead- 
ing spirit of which is Hugh Allen, a Scot, to whom 
a complimentary dinner was given in 1856, at Quebec, 
by the chief members of the mercantile community 
of both lower and upper Canada. Then there is the 
Cunard Line, concerning which Mark Twain wrote 
a few years ago, a characteristic article entitled, 
" Origin and Queer Ways, etc., of a Pioneer Steam 
Ship company." He says: "It is a curious, self* 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 71 

possessed, old=fashioned company, the Cunard. 
(Scotchmen they are.) It was born before the days 
of steamshijjs. It inaugurated steamer lines: it never 
has lost more than one vessel: it has never lost a 
a jjassenger's life at all: its ships are never insured: 
great mercantile firms do not insure their goods sent 
over in Cunard ships: it is rather safer to be in their 
vessels than on shore." Then Mark Twain tells us 
why all this safety is secured, and why the line is 
called the Cunard line. He says: "Before adopt- 
ing a new thing, the chiefs cogitate and cogi- 
tate and cogitate; then they lay it before their 
head purveyor, their head merchant, their head 
builder, their head engineer; and all the captains in 
the service, and they go off and cogitate about 
a year; then if the new wrinkle is approved, 
it is adopted, and put into the regulations." "It 
takes them about ten or fifteen years to manu- 
facture a captain." " The noted Cunard Company 
is composed simply of two or three grandchildren 
who have stepped into the shoes of two or three chil- 
dren who stepped into the shoes of a couple of old 
Scotch fathers; for Burns and Mac Ivor were the 
company when it was born ... it is Burns and 
Mac Ivor still in the third generation. Burns was a 
Glasgow merchant, Mac Ivor was an old sea=dog who 
sailed a ship for him in early times. Burns and Mac 
Ivor and Judge Haliburton ("Sam Slick") fell to 
considering a scheme of getting a job to carry the 
mails. They needed faster vessels. Haliburton had a 
relative who was not a shining success in practical life, 
but had an inventive head, named Sam Cunard; 
he took an old jacknife and a shingle and whittled 



72 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

out this enormous Royal Mail line of vessels that we 
call the Cunarders — a great navy it is — doing business 
in every ocean; owning forty =five steamships of vast 
cost," " It has servants by hundreds of thousands." 
" In its own private establishment in Liverpool 
it keeps 4,000 men under pay." Says the Scoftisli 
American of October 8, 1890. "The life of Sir 
George Burns, one of the founders of the Cunard 
Company, has just been published by Hodder and 
Stoughton, London, and will be read with interest by 
Scotchmen in all parts of the world. Besides de- 
scribing the business career of the brothers Burns, 
the author devotes a considerable amount of atten- 
tion to George's philanthroj)ic and charitable works. 
In his youth he was a friend and co-worker with Dr. 
Chalmers, but he early became an Episcopalian of the 
evangelical school, and in his later years he main- 
tained an Episcopalian chapel at his residence at 
Wemys bay." 

The HoiigJx-ong Daily Press tells of a novel 
wager made between two captains of steamers trad- 
ing in that port; one was a Scotchman, the other an 
American. The Scot bet twenty^five dollars and a 
bottle of Champagne that five out of every six of the 
engineers on steamers were Scots. Both captains 
tested six steamers, and the Scotch captain won the 
bet. 

SCOTCH ENGINEERS. 

Before leaving steam let us inquire. 

Who invented the sixty=ton steam derrick crane? 
The Scottish American of June 21. 1883, says: " D. J. 
Dunlap & Co., shipbuilders and engineers. Port Glas- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 73 

gow, are about to take a ' new departure' in connexion 
with the mechanical appliances for facilitating the work 
of lifting heavy l)oilers, engines, etc., on board of ves- 
sels which they have occasion to fit out before leaving 
the Inch Works, where they have been built. They 
were first invented by Mr. David Henderson, whose 
brother was one of the contractors for the Crystal 
Palace, in which the Hyde Park Exhibition of 1851 
was held, and where they were first used in lifting the 
iron girders, etc., required for that building." It should 
also be noted that what is called " the steam crane ' 
was invented by R. W. Thomson, of Edinburgh; also 
traction engine wheels — for common roads — of vulcan- 
ized India rubber. He was the inventor of " the 
steamer omnibus," which has not, however, been a 
pojDular success. But although some Scotchmen may 
fail, as other geniuses do, in their projects, they are 
for the most part successful. As McFarlane says, 
" The Scotch inventions have mostly been of a real 
practical character, and have been universally adopted 
by all nations." 

NEW YORK ELEVATED RAILROADS. 

As another instance of Scotch engineering skill 
we may briefly notice that of Mr. John Baird, a na- 
tive of Kirkintilloch, Dumbartonshire, who died in 
New York in 1891. He was superintending engineer 
of the Cromwell line of steamers running between 
New York and New Orleans. He spent twenty years 
in that service, and acquired a wide rei^utation both as 
a marine architect and as the designer of all kinds of 
engineering undertakings. It was from his plans and 
under his personal superintendence that the Second 



74 SCOTLAND'S SHARE W CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Avenue and Sixth Avenue Elevated Railroads of New 
York were constructed, hebeintr at the time vice-pres- 
ident and executive officer of the Metropolitan Eleva- 
ted Railroad Company. He was a true Scot. A mem- 
ber of the St. Andrew's Society for many years, and 
was frequently a participant in the society's celebra- 
tions of St. Andrew's day." {Scoifish American). 
Another instance is that of James Ferguson, a native 
of Ayr, 1S08, who wrote extensively on the subject of 
civil engineering, correcting certain errors in it ; and 
was general superintendent of the Crystal Palace of 
Sydenham, England. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

The thistle being a very locomotive plant we have 
already noticed its tendency to travel by steamer and 
railway; let us now see how it gets over the world by 
other means. 

BALLOONS. 

Who invented the balloon? Surely sober=minded 
Scotchmen would never think of such a thing! But 
they did. They made the first balloon, and made the 
first ascension in a balloon, in Britain. 

Frederick Whymper, in Good Words says, that 
"Dr. Black of Edinburgh taught his students in 1766 
that hydrogen in a thin bag would rise to the ceiling. 
He j)i*ovided the bladder of a calf for the purpose, 
and his experiment failed; he did not repeat it, and 
may therefore be said to have missed a great discov- 
ery." Now Dr. Whymper is mistaken or telling what 
is not true, as the following may show. It is taken 
from a book entitled, Uj^ in the Clouds or Balloon 
Voyages; being Vol. XII. of Ballantyne's Miscel- 
lany. London, James Nesbit & Company, 1864. 

" The germ of the invention of the balloon lies in 
the discovery of Mr. Cavendeth, made in 1766, that 
hydrogen gas, called inflammable air, is at least seven 
times lighter than atmospheric air." Founding on 

75 



76 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

this fact Dr. Black, of Edinburgh, proved by experi- 
ments that a very thin bag filled with gas would rise 
to the ceiling of the room. In Dr. Thomson's His- 
tory of Chemistry an anecdote related by Mr. Ben- 
jamin Bell, refers to this, as follows: " Soon after the 
appearance of Cavendeth's paper on hydrogen gas, in 
which he made an approximation to the specific 
gravity of that body, showing that it was at least ten 
times lighter than common air, Dr. Black invited a 
party of friends to supj^er informing them that he had 
a curiosity to show them. Dr. Hutton, Mr. Clerk, of 
Eldin, and Sir George Clerk, of Pennycuick, were of 
the number. When the company invited had arrived 
he took them into a room where he had the allantois 
of a calf filled with hydrogen gas; and upon setting it 
at liberty it immediately ascended and adhered to the 
ceiling. The phenomenon, they thought, was easily 
accounted for; it w^as taken for granted that a small 
black thread had been attached to the allantois; that 
the thread jiassed through the ceiling; and that some 
one in the apartment above by pulling the thread ele- 
vated it to the ceiling and kept it in its position. This 
explanation was so plausible that it was agreed to by 
the whole company; though like other plausible theo- 
ries it turned out wholly fallacious, for when the 
allantois was brought down, no thread whatever was 
found attached to it. Dr. Black explained the cause 
of the ascent, to his admiring friends; but such 
was his carelessness of his own reputation that he 
never gave the least account of this curious experi- 
ment even to his class; and several years elapsed be- 
fore the obvious property of hydrogen gas was applied 
to the elevation of balloons." 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 77 
THE FIRST AERIAL VOYAGES MADE IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

The credit of the first aerial voyage made in Great 
Britain has usually been given to Vincenzo Lunardi, 
an Italian. There is ground for believing, however, 
that the first balloon voyage was performed by a 
Scotchman, as the following extract from Chambers's 
Book of Days will show. 

" It is generally sux)posed that Lunardi was the 
first person who ascended by means of a balloon in 
Great Britain; but he certainly was not. A very poor 
man named James Tytler, who then lived in Edin- 
burgh, supporting himself and family in the humblest 
style of garret or cottage life by the exercise of his 
pen, had this honour. He had effected an ascent on 
the 27th of August, 1784, just nineteen days previous 
to Lunardi's." 

THE KITE. 

The Kite (or draigon, as it is called in Scotland) 
has in various forms become a useful instrument in 
scientific research in the departments of meteorology 
and aerial navigation. Who first used the kite for 
such a purpose? The American is apt to reply that 
it was Benjamin Franklin, who, in 1752, used the 
kite to demonstrate that lightning was electricity: 
and now, in May 27, 1897, the papers tell us that, 
"By the use of kites the Weather Bureau at Wash- 
ington exj)ects to be soon able to forecast the weather 
with greater accuracy and for a longer period." But 
Scotland long ago practically anticii^ated all such 
experiments, and even that of Franklin, by three or 
four years. For Lt. Hugh D. Wise, U. S. A., in the 



78 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Century magazine for May, 1897, says, that in 1749 
Dr. Alexander Wilson and Mr. Thomas Melville, in 
Scotland, used it for taking the temperature of the 
upper air, and the kite, hitherto a useless toy, thus 
showed possibilities of becoming a useful and scien- 
tific apparatus." 

THE BICYCLE, 

Who invented the bicycle, that useful, speedy, 
pleasurable little vehicle which is now " all the rage " 
throughout the civilized world? Says the Scottish 
American, October 11, 1883: "Considerable discus- 
sion has taken place of late, both in the newspapers 
of this and of the old country, as to who was the 
inventor of the bicycle. The honour is really worth 
fighting for. 

" Then who was he? We are glad to be able to say 
that there is no doubt he was (like Watt, and a host 
of the world's other benefactors) a Scotchman. 
Many years before that little Frenchman, Pierre 
Lallement, in 1864. made a bicycle in Paris, one had 
been made in Scotland. Nearly twenty years before 
that, the bicycle had been the wonder of the day 
there. Writing to a correspondent of the Bicycle 
Xeivs, Mr. Thomas Brown, of Lesmaliagow, claims the 
honour of the invention as due to the late Mr. Gavin 
Dalzell, merchant, Lesmahagow, Lanarkshire, and 
says: 'It is a fact, established incontrovertibly by 
written proof, that so far back as the summer of 
1846, at the very latest, he (Galvin Dalzell) had a 
bicycle of his own invention in almost daily use. 
And, according to the oral evidence of many people, 
and also to a statement made in a paragraph pub- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 79 

lished in a newspaper widely circulated in the Upper 
Ward of Lanarkshire, and which was not contra- 
dicted, his bicycle had been constructed several 
years before 1846.' And that ' prior to his inven- 
tion of the bicycle he had invented a tricycle, the 
propulsion of which was effected by its rider in a 
way both ingenious and unique.' " 

There is, however, another Scottish claimant for the 
invention. Let antiquarians decide between them. 
"An interesting exhibition of horseless carriages," says 
the Scottish American, May 27, 1896, " was opened 
with civic pomp and ceremony at the Crystal Palace, 
London, on the 2nd inst., and an exhibition illustra- 
tive of the evolution of the modern bicycle has also 
been got together. What is commonly believed to 
be the first bicycle ever made as distinguished from 
the old hobby horse is on view, It dates back to 
1840, was made by Kirkpatrick Macmillan, and is lent 
by Mr. T. McCall, Kilmarnock, an old apprentice of 
Macmillan, who made many of these machines in 
the later '40's and early '50s. The exhibit has a 
portrait of the inventor attached to the machine with 
the following inscription. ' Kirkpatrick Macmillan, 
inventor, builder, and rider of the first bicyle. Year 
1839.' " 

Following this exhibition, the papers announce 
a suggestion that " a monument be erected in Dum- 
fries, Scotland, to Kirkpatrick Macmillan, the now ac- 
knowledged inventor of the bicycle." Scottish Amer- 
ican, November 17, 1896, and Scientific American, 
July 25, 1896. 

But who invented the pneumatic tire for bicycles? 
Let the following portion of a long article in the 



80 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

journal named Black and White, quoted in full in 
the Scottish American, May 19, 1897, tell: 

ON THE TIRE. 

Interview with Mr. J. B. Dunlop. 

" The Dunlop pneumatic tire is one of the things 
you must have heard of, whether you cycle or not. 
Cyclists, it is believed, when they are in a reverent 
spirit, bless the name of Dunlop, and think with 
pity of those whose cycling days were over before 
the inventor of the pneumatic tires beamed upon 
a grateful world. In order, therefore, to gratify 
everybody, a representative of Black and IVhitc took 
advantage of a visit of Mr. J. B. Dunlop to London 
to ask him about the invention which has made his 
name famous all the world over. He had just re- 
ceived a telegram from his agent in Dublin, announc- 
ing the successful issue of a lawsuit in which he was 
interested, but had not taken the trouble to read the 
account of it in the papers; the telegram was quite 
enough for him. 

" ' You are not an Irishman, Mr. Dunlop, though 
you live in Ireland?' 'No, no,' said Mr. Dunlop, 
' I am a Scotsman.' The question was indeed un- 
necessary; for you can always tell a Scot, and Mr. 
Dunlop is a powerful one. * I was born in Ayrshire 
in '40, and I own a freehold there that has belonged 
to our family two or three centuries.' 

" ' You'll be returning some day to rebuild the fam- 
ily mansion?' 'Hoot no,' said Mr. Dunlop, with a 
smile. 

" ' You have not been always interested in cycles? ' 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 81 

' I was a veterinary surj^eon, and had retired from 
my profession before I ever thought of cyck^s. I 
studied and won my defj^ree in Edinburgh, and then 
went to the north of Ireland, where I have been 
ever since.' 

" ' You would not have much time for inventions?' 
' I wouldn't say that,' Mr. Dunlop I'omarked, quietly. 
' I always took an interest in things outside my pro- 
fession, though I had a very large business. I used 
to pay over £300 a year for rent and kept two quali- 
fied assistants, thirteen horse shoers, and three 
hostlers. In connection with my profession I in- 
vented some things which helped me very much. I 
invented, for examjale, new frost cogs for sharpening 
horses that came to be known as the ' Irish Pattern,' 
and long before the germ theory was understood in 
relation to wounds I had invented and used an anti- 
septic for wounds that came to be known among the 
peoijle as the ' Magic Water.' These things helj)ed 
me very considerably. Many years ago I read a 
paper on the germ theory and antiseptics. I have 
also read papers on meteorology, on the science and 
theory of music, and on charms and superstitions in 
con7iection with diseases, etc' " 

Mr. Dunlop then describes the i^rocess of his in- 
vention, and how " at last he hit upon comi)ressed 
air, cloth, and rubber, as the most durable, flexible, 
and light." 

THE BICYCLE SKATE. 

The Edinburgh Weekly Scotsman, of August 2, 
1897, says: 

" A considerable time ago Mr, Anderson, of Princes 



82 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

street, Edinburgh, completed the construction of a 
bicycle skate, and at the time considerable attention 
was given to the invention. After the interest first 
awakened had died out, we heard nothing more of the 
bicycle skate, till now the Americans have taken it up. 
In the last number of the Chicago Tribune that has 
reached us there is a long description of a trial given 
to the skates in New York by Mr. Earl Reynolds of 
Chicago, amateur champion skater of the United 
States. 

"The skates are the logical outcome of applying the 
bicycle idea to the old roller skate. They consist of a 
curved plate of thin metal ending in a fork at each 
end. In each of these forks is fitted a small bicycle 
wheel. The foot rests in the depression of the metal 
curve about two inches above the ground, and the 
wheels which are six inches in diameter, project in 
front of and behind the foot. This arrangement 
affords great stability, and one can walk with ease on 
them. 

" At the close of his exhibition Mr. Reynolds said: 
" ' The rival and jjerhaps supplanter of the bicycle is 
here at last. I am an expert on the wheel and I love 
it, but I tell you this road skating is far better. In 
the first place there is little danger of a fall or acci- 
dent of any kind. You can go over the roughest 
roads with ease at a remarkable rate of speed. If you 
want to go across country to some point of interest, 
wade across a brook, or even climb a cliff, you can do 
it and take your skates with you.' " 

A NEW WHEEL — 1898. 

" Of all recent inventions having reference to loco- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 83 

motion that of the pneumatic tire is perhaps the most 
important, and in the very few years since its intro- 
duction it has brought large fortunes to many. What 
may possibly be a serious rival to it in its aj)plication 
to vehicles other than cycles has just been jjatented 
by Mr. Peter Fyfe, chief sanitary inspector of Glas- 
gow. Mr. Fyfe's experiments were with a view to re- 
duce the vibration communicated by an ordinary 
wheel to vehicles as well as to the horse attached to 
such vehicles. This has resulted in the invention of 
what he terms a pneumatic sleeve, which is made in 
one piece and drawn tightly over the axle=box. The 
wheel is pushed on to this rubber sleeve and then se- 
cured by steel bands. The sleeve, which is cellular in 
structure, is then pumped full of air to a pressure of 
about thirty^five pounds to the square inch. These 
cells are, as at present designed, four in number; and 
after charging with air each one can be isolated from 
the other by the turning of some small screws. By 
this arrangement the axle and axle-box are floated, 
and do not touch the nave of the wheel. Careful 
tests show that seventy=seven per cent, of the shocks 
which, under ordinary conditions, would be trans- 
mitted to the vehicle are taken up by this cushion of 
air and then dissipated. Three vehicles of different 
types have been fitted with pneumatic sleeves to their 
wheels, and careful diagrams taken by means of at- 
tached apparatus, the results being considered by ex- 
j)erts as highly satisfactory. By fitting the pneu- 
matic cushion to the middle of the wheel instead of to 
its periphery it will at once be seen that puncturing 
in the ordinary sense of the word is quite out of the 
question. The reduction in the amount of rubber 



84 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IX CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

necessary in the manufacture, as compared to the 
pneumatic tire, points, it would seem, to a great sav- 
ing in cost of material." 

GEOLOGY. 

Which nation has done most for the advancement 
of geological science ? I think we may safely say 
Scotland. We can at least claim some of the most 
eminent names which the scientific world has hitherto 
honoured for their researches, discoveries, and writ- 
ings in this department. Such as Hugh Miller, 
Hutton, Lyell, Murchison, Sir Archibald Geikie, Di- 
rector General of the Geological Survey in Britain, 
and others of less note. In 1892, wh^n Sir Archibald 
was president of the British Association for the Ad- 
vancement of Science, he, in the course of his open- 
ing address claimed for Edinburgh the honour of be- 
ing the birthplace of geology as a science properly 
60- called, 



CHAPTER IX. 



MILITARY AFFAIRS. 



If war, and bravery, and victory in war are influ- 
ential in proniotin<jj the world's enli^ditenment and 
civilization, then Scotland has contributed her fair 
share. As good illustrations of that fact I cannot do 
better then quote : 

"The following extract from an amusing speech 
delivered recently by Mr. A. McKenzie in the 
New Brunswick Legislature which contains many 
capital points, and will be relished by our Highland 
readers. Referring to a proposition that the Agricul- 
tural r(^port would be printed in the French language, 
Mr. McKenzie said that members of the House would 
do well to ask if there is no other language that de- 
serves attention, since lecturers show, or attempt to 
sliow, that without the shadow of a doubt the High- 
landers of Scotland are descended from the house of 
Israel, and it cannot be denied that the Celtic people 
gave its present lustre to Britain's glory. Who, I 
would ask, gave the prophesied colonies to Britain? 
Who wrested our country from the grasp of the 
French and vested it in the British Crown? Who 
scaled the heights of Quebec; and what music first 
proclaimed to Wolfe that victory perched on the 
British banner? It was the sweet music that was 
never tuned to a retreat. Who drove the French 

85 



86 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

from the Egyptian trenches? 'Twas they who un- 
derstood the command — Chni na Gdcl, gnalain ri 
(/itahflii! Can we forp:et the chaise }t Waterloo, 
when tlie Highbinders took hold of the stirrups of the 
Endiskillen Dragoons and Scots Grays, and with the 
shout, 'Scotland forever!' relieved the Iron Duke 
of the wish for night or Bliicher? That shout told 
the Man of Destiny that his fate was sealed, and that 
his country was no longer for him. Who drove the 
myriads of Sepoys beft)re them? 'Twas Campbell's 
undaunted brigade; and though the seven ty=eiglitli 
Highlanders, perhaps, under Havelock saved India, 
they being of the McKenzie clan I therefore withhold 
what might be their proper meed of praise for obvious 
reasons! Wlio scaled Alma's Heights? Was it not 
the Highland brigade? Who are they who scorned 
to receive the Cossacks in square? That thin red line, 
sir; the Highland Brigade. Who entered Ihe fort at 
Sebastopol when their allies were repulsed, and who 
prevented the Russians from retaking the Balaklava? 
It was the Highland Brigade! Still later in the 
Ashantee and other wars, we have the Highlanders 
adding lustre to Britain's arms. But, wanting the 
Highlanders, we find in wars where they drew not 
the sabre and charged not with the bayonet, that Brit- 
ain's martial glory was dimmed; and kx)king back 
over the vista of the years, we remember when Brit- 
ain was of small account and that she became 
' Great ' only when Scotland joined her. Wherever 
the English tongue prevails a Scotch name is found 
to honour the head of the administration. Thus a Grant 
ruled in the neighbouring Republic and has given way 
only to a Hayes — ' the Douglas and the Hay.' An- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 87 

other instance is found in our own dominion, but my 
modesty a^ain forbids that I should dwell on that part 
of the sul)je(^t. The manifest destiny of the English 
is that they shall predominate, because of their asso- 
ciation with the Scotch, and if any language is to be 
particularly fostered it is that of those who gave and 
preserved these colonies to the British Crown. We, 
as Scotsmen, however, do not ask for legislative en- 
actments, nor do we beg for subsidies to maintain our 
language, for it is a gem to be displayed only on great 
occasions, and it is fitting only for the expression of 
great things. The English language is destined to be 
the language of the world — the language of the com- 
merce — and where there is a Frenchman who as- 
pires to honour and enlightenment, though he may 
not attain to Gaelic, he will learn English. I was 
surprised awhile ago to hear an honourable member 
say the Scotch was no language. It was a language 
before the French or English was ever thought of, 
and that gentleman, himself a Celt, should feel no 
pride in arguing against the language of his remote 
forefathers in favour of another and an alien tongue. 
To the victors belong the spoils. The British were 
the victors in this country, and those who acceptcul 
the conqueror's protection, and the free citizenship 
they now enjoy under the British flag, should also ac- 
cept the English language." 

" The sweet music " of the bagpipe, "which was 
never tuned to a retreat," is evidently now coming 
prominently to the front where some folk will be as- 
tonished to find it; for thus, we read, in the Toronto 
Mdil (ind Empire, of October 12, 1896. 

" Bagpipes are becoming a fashionable instrument 



88 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

for ladies in British drawing=rooms, Lady Elspeth 
Campbell, the Duke of Argyle's granddaughter, who 
is a skilled performer, having introduced the fashion. 
The pipes for parlour use are richly decorated and 
specially toned." 

Then in the same paper, of the following month, 
November 28, comes the following item: 

"Orders have recently been received from the colonel 
of a French regiment for Scotch bagpipes, the in- 
tention being to introduce pipe bands into the French 
army." 

Some people, however, cannot appreciate the 
Scotch bagpipes; in fact they are accustomed to 
utter some very disparaging remarks anent them. 
Their dislike, however, may arise from a defect in 
their musical taste or cultivation; or from their not 
having those memorable historical associations with 
the pipes which are awakened in the minds of 
Highlanders especially by pibroch music. Moreover 
they may never have heard a full band of pipers such 
as Highland regiments have, and therefore have had no 
opportunity of comparing good pipe music with that 
of the brass band. As illustrative of how much the 
music of the pipes may be depreciated by some 
listeners and how highly appreciated by others, the 
following episode may here be related, with the 
needed explanation for some readers, that, in the 
German language, a common name for the bagpipe is 
dudelsack. 

BAGPIPES ARE MUSICAL. 

Views of Mr. John Johnson. 
" A decision by a Milwaukee jury some time ago 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 89 

in which it was decided that the Scotch bagpipe is a 
doodle-sack which 'emitted an unearthly noise,' and 
upon which a verdict of $150 damages was rendered 
the owner of a horse that became frightened at doodle- 
sack music, ran away, and was killed, has attracted 
attention all over the country. Newspapers from 
Maine to Mexico have taken the matter up and com- 
mented thereon, in both a light and serious vein, 
and in some instances advantage has been taken 
of Milwaukee's large German population to precipi- 
tate a war between Scotia and the Vaterland. Mr. 
John Johnston was asked by a local newspaper to 
come to the rescue of the instrument so i^opular in 
his native land, and delivered himself as follows: 

" ' Is it not rather late to interview me on the 
doodle=sack question? I am not a German scholar 
but I am told that the doodle=sack means wind-bag, 
and as the greatest orators as well as the finest sing- 
ers have been called wind=bags it is not surprising 
the souhstirring bagpipe should be classed in the 
same category. Strictly speaking they are all doodle- 
sacks. I have a much greater respect for that horse 
which ran away at the sound of the bagpipes 
than for the Court who decided it was not music. 
The horse understood that such inspiring strains 
called for corresponding action, and that no inane 
jog4rot was equal to the occasion. He, therefore, 
ran away, which was the best thing he could do 
under the circumstances. Had he been in the ranks 
of the Scots' Greys at Waterloo or Balaclava he 
would have charged the ranks of the enemy. 

" ' There is music, and music. If music be wanted 
in the parlour to sooth you or put you to sleep, then 



90 SCOTLAND'S SIlAttE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

the bagpipes should not be selected. Neither, for 
that matter, should a big drum and a brass horn. 
When it comes to putting every drop of blood in 
your veins in a tingle so that you have got to move 
M'hether you will or not, let the bagpipes or the fife 
and drum be called forth. Let a brass band take 
one street and a dozen bagpipes, or fifes and drums 
the other street and the brass band will hardly have a 
follower. 

" ' It is said of Shon Maclean, the duke's own 
piper: — 

" ' Like the whistling of birds, like the humming of bees, 
Like the sough of the south wind in the trees, 
Like the singing of angels, the playing of shams 
Like the ocean itself, with its storms and its calms. 
Were the pipes of Shon when he strutted and blew, 
A cock whose crowing creation knew.' 

" 'Of course the bagpipes at their best must be 
heard amid the hills and glens of their own land, or 
at the head of a Scottish regiment at Bannockburn 
or Lucknow. 

" ' Was it not a ludicrous spectacle — the bagpipes 
on trial before a Milwaukee justice of the peace? 

" * The New England poet, Whittier, had some 
appreciation of the wondrous power of the pipes 
giving out at one time the wild MacGregor's clan 
call, sharp and shrill, like swords at strife, and again 
the sweet and home-like strain of 'Auld Lang Syne.' 
That poet in his ' Kelief of Lucknow' says: — 

" 'Pipes of the misty moorland. 
Voice of the glens and hills. 
The droning of the torrent. 
And the treble of the rills, 



SCOTLAND'S SHAttE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 1)1 

Not the braes of broom and heather, 
Nor the mountains dark witli rain, 

Nor maiden bower, nor borden tower, 
Have heard your sweetest strain. 



Sweet sounds the ancient pibroch 

Over mountain, loch, and glade. 
But the sweetest of all music 

The pipes at Lucknow played.' 

'* ' The great American poet tlioiight the pipes at 
Lucknow gave out the sweetest of all music. ' " 

Who suggested the establishment of stationary li- 
braries in every barracks of the British army — one of 
the greatest boons to military men, ft)r their mental 
and moral improvement? It was Dr. Thomas Light- 
body a Glasgow physician. * 

MILITARY FIREARMS. 

Who invented the percussion cax) for firearms, 
which is the parent of the needle=gun, and of all the 
modern cartridges? It was the Rev. John Forsyth, 
of B(^lhelvie, Aberdeenshire. 

Who invented the safe handling of big guns dur- 
ing firing in ships and forts? Let the following tell: 

"The Moncrieif gun-carriage — the action of which 
is on the same principle as that of a rockingdiorse — ; 
has recently been tried in England with twelve=ton 
guns, and is found to answer as well as with guns of 
lighter weight. It was asserted that however applica- 
ble the principle might be to light pieces, it would 
not do for heavy seige guns; but the trials have 
shown this view to be incorrect. By the Moncrieif 
system, guns and men are out of sight, and below the 



92 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

level of the parapet while loading, and only visible 
during the short time occupied in firing," 

Who is Hem-y of the Henry Martini rifle? Alex- 
ander Henry of Edinburgh. In the early part of 
1852 he produced the first three grooved shallow seg- 
mental butt rifle, with six and a half feet spiral, which 
was afterwards adopted as the British service arm, 
and known as the Henry Martini rifle, so long cele- 
brated at home and abroad. 

And who is Lee of the Lee Straight-Pull rifle? We 
get the answer from the welhknown, intelligent, and 
versatile writer. Kit; at present engaged at Tampa, 
W. I., as war correspondent for the Toronto Mail and 
Empire. She says in that paper (June 11, 1898): 

" Still Mars has the field, and he is great, and I love 
the ' hot wind of his breath.' The sound of the fir- 
ing is good to hear, and almost every morning I go to 
listen to the crack of the Krag Jorgensen and the Lee 
Straight=Pull. Lee, the father of magazine rifles, is 
by the way, a Scotchman, who emigrated to Gait, On- 
tario, and lived there till the breaking out of the 
American Civil War, when he went over to the states 
"with some of his ' infernal ' inventions, and is now, I 
believe, at Hartford, Conn., which place is the great 
factory of small-arms, being the home of the Colt, the 
Winchester, and others. Lee was twenty^eight when 
he left Gait for the war in the sixties. The Lee 
StraightsPull has been adopted in connexion with 
the Krag= Jorgensen by the Government for the army, 
and is giving great satisfaction. Many prefer it to 
the Krag=Jorgensen, whose caliber, thirty, gives the 
bullet great velocity. The bullet is so light, however, 
that it is affected by the wind, while the rapidity 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 93 

with which it revolves causes it to drift sideways, ne- 
cessitating, in shooting at distances above 500 yards, 
an allowance of from five to fifteen feet to the side of 
the target." 

A NAVAL HERO. 

There is a name among those of brave, skilful, and 
successful heroes in naval warfare, which ought to be 
better known and ajjpreciated among Scottish 
readers. I refer to Lord Dundonald. 

The Toronto 3I((il and Empire of May 2, 
1896, in a review of Albert R. J, F. Hassard's Life 
of Lord Dundonald, recently published, says: 

"Thomas Cochrane, the future Lord Cochrane and 
tenth Earl of Dundonald, the greatest of modern 
commanders, the establisher of England's pre-emi- 
nence on the seas, the maker of distant nations, the 
hero of the most splendid naval engagements of this 
century, was born in a humble home in Aunsfield, 
Lanarkshire, in Scotland, on the 14th of December, 
1775. At the age of eighteen his father consented to 
his beginning life as a seaman; and in 1793 he em- 
barked on his first voyage on the ship ' Hind,' at 
Sheerness. Then began that stormy career, which 
after many adversities, many calamities, and many 
complications, terminated sixty=seven years after- 
wards, when, after having by his genius given to 
England the undisputed sovereignty of the ocean, 
and having left the traces of his nautical ability 
deeply graven on the armaments of more than 
one foreign nation; after having reared against him- 
self formidable conspiracies, which were never over- 
thrown until they were conquered by death; after 



94 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 




LORD DUNDONALD. 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 95 

having created more personal enemies than the great- 
est iDublic character of his time, yet living until all 
of his personal enemies had become friends; after 
having gained and lost and again gained distinctions 
as a reward of his ability, disease dragged him down 
to a mature death, and he was accorded, with the ap- 
plause of his entire generation, the distinguished 
honour of interment in Westminster Abbey, to repose 
in that sepulchre as an evidence of the gratitude 
with which England remembers the men who made 
her great." 

To the foregoing may be added, that the Whig ad- 
ministration under Earl Grey, 1831, believing him to 
be the victim of a cruel and unjust persecution, has- 
tened to restore him to his naval rank. In 1847 
Queen Victoria conferred on him the Grand Cross of 
the Bath. On his retirement from active service he 
devoted himself to scientific inventions — pooj) and 
signal lights, and naval projectiles. He declared 
himself in possession of a means of annihilating an 
enemy's fleet; and during the Russian war, offered to 
destroy Sebastopol in a few hours with perfect safety 
to the assailants; his plans, however, were rejected. 
He died, October 31, 1860, while holding the rank of 
Rear Admiral of the United Kingdom. 



CHAPTER X. 

But let us return to the Arts of Peace. 

Who invented the moulds from which the raised 
type for the blind is cast? It was Thomas Mitchel, 
a native of Edinburgh, who died in Brooklyn, N. Y., 
July, 1892, aged 54. (Scottish American, July 6, 
1892.) 

But the blind, throughout the world, have been 
further benefitted, we might say enlightened, by an- 
other Scot, as is shown by the following clipping 
from a Glasgow paper of 1861, and copied the same 
year in the Montreal Witness: 

DEATH OF AN INGENIOUS BLIND MAN. 

" We readily insert the following from a correspond- 
ent: 

"On Friday, 22nd February, William Laingdied at 
No. 62 Weaver Street. He was born in Bothwell, in 
the year 1805, and was an outmate of the Glasgow 
Asylum for the Blind for upwards of 30 years. 
About twenty- five years ago he made an improve- 
ment on the arithmetical board for the blind, which 
enables them to perform, with great accuracy and 
facility, calculations in any department of arithmetic; 
and so excellent is the method of teaching by this 
board that it has been adopted by all the institutions 
for the blind in this country, and even in those of 

96 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 97 

America. Yet, although his improvement was of 
such importance in enabling the blind to obtain the 
advantage of this branch of education, thanks was 
the only reward he ever received. His death is much 
lamented by all his friends and associates, who knew 
the worth of the pure and rational pleasure they en- 
joyed in his company." To the foregoing I must 
add that William Laing must have been a genius of 
no ordinary character, for his friends in Canada in- 
form me that he also contrived and constructed " an 
orrery of considerable dimensions" — an astronomical 
machine for exhibiting and illustrating (to the blind, 
I presume) the various movements of the planetary 
system. 

STEREOTYPE. 

The world's enlightenment is greatly indebted to 
the cheapness of books and magazines, and the cheap- 
ness is indebted to stereotype; for when the types of 
a book have once been set up, and an impression 
taken of them in type metal, no further setting up of 
type is required for future editions. 

Who invented stereotype? William Ged of Edin- 
burgh, a jeweller, in 1735. 

Who invented postage=stamps which we stick on 
letters and papers? Let the following tell: 

INVENTION OF POSTAGE STAMPS. 

The postage=stamp will celebrate its fiftieth anni- 
versary this year. The invention is due to printer 
James Chalmers, of Dundee, who died in 1858, and 
who finally, with his system, the adhesive post- 
age-stamp, conquered the whole civilized world. 



98 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

England, fifty years ago, introduced the postage^ 
stamp, and according to a decree of December 21, 

1839, issued the first stamps for public use on May 6, 

1840. A year later they were introduced in the 
United States of North America and Switzerland, 
and again a few years later, in Bavaria, Belgium and 
France. One of the most important and valuable 
collections of postage stamps is in the German Impe- 
rial Post Office Museum, which contains over 10,000 
postage=stamp5 and other postal delivery devices.— 
American Notes and Queries. 

Who gave the first circulating library to the world? 
It was Allan Ramsay, author of " The Gentle SJiep- 
herd.'''' The Leisure Hour for 1861, p. 421, says: 

" The first circulating library in London was estab* 
lished about 1740. The Edinburgh circulating 
library, founded in 1725, by the celebrated Allan 
Ramsay, is the oldest institution of the kind in 
Britain." 

mechanics' institutes. 

Who gave Mechanics' Institutes to the world? It 
was the Andersonian University of Glasgow. Here 
was established what w^as called an " anti4oga class "; 
that is, a class which did not wear the college " toga " 
or gown. It was intended chiefly for manufacturers 
and the higher class of mechanics. But the fee of 
one guinea and the hour for meeting proved at last a 
hindrance to its success. The fee was then abolished, 
a suitable hour for meeting was appointed on Satur- 
day evenings, and all mechanics who desired instruc- 
tion were invited to attend. Dr. Birkbeck, a York- 
shire man, educated in Edinburgh was entrusted with 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 99 

the class. The first evening the attendance was 
seventy=five, next evening, 200, and the next after, 500. 
Birkbeck, two or three years afterwards, 1804, went 
to London, and in 1821, under Lord Brougham's 
powerful advocacy, he established a similar institution 
there and others throughout England. One Claxton 
attempted to found a similar institution in London, 
but failed. He wrote a little work illustrated with a 
wood=cut of a tinsmith's shop in Glasgow as the birth- 
place of Mechanics' Institutes. His reason for select- 
ing so humble a birthplace was simply this, that 
Birkbeck was accustomed to go there and instruct the 
tinsmith how to make or mend philosophical instru- 
ments for the Institute. Birkbeck's biographer says 
that " Glasgow was unquestionably the first place 
where a genuine and enduring Mechanics' Institute 
was established." 

But who was Anderson? All working men, and 
especially Scotchmen ought to honour his memory. 
Here is what Beeton says of him: "John Anderson, 
one of the earliest promoters of scientific instruction 
among the working class and the founder of the 
Glasgow Andersonian Institution. Born at Rose- 
neath, Dumbarton, 1721, died in Glasgow, 1796. It 
was by Anderson that the plan was devised of send- 
ing, by gas=inflated paper balloons, newspapers and 
other communications from France into Germany 
when all other means of conveyance were intercepted 
by a cordon of troops between the countries." 

FREEMASONRY, 

Freemasonry is said to be of great antiquity, and to 
be greatly influential in promoting the world's enlight- 



100 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

enment and civilization. Its high antiquity, dating as 
it does at least from the building of King Solomon's 
Temple, precludes the idea of its being of Scottish 
origin. Yet, judging by what its writers are pleased 
to make known to us, Scotland must have had in 
ages past a foremost part both in its preservation and 
dissemination throughout the world. In McKey's 
Lexicon of Freemasonry we are told that the ancient 
and accepted Scottish rite of thirty-three degrees is 
" next to the York rite, perhaps the most extensively 
diffused throughout the Masonic world." David Mur- 
ray Lyon, in the Preface to his magnificent volume, 
" The History of the Lodge of Edinburgh," declares 
that " Scotland possesses the oldest authentic Masonic 
records known to exist." Similar testimony from an 
English source is given in a small but very learned 
and sensible volume, entitled " The History and Illus- 
tration of Free Masonry, compiled from an Ancient 
Publication." It is dedicated, by permission, to the 
worshipful master, officers, and brethren of the 
Lodge of Unity, number 214, Ringwood, Hants; and 
published by Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy; and G. B. 
Whittaker, Ave Maria Lane, London, 1826. In 
various parts of the book the author refers to the 
building of Kilwinning Abbey, Scotland, by Free 
Masons in the year 1140, and to the ancient lodge of 
Kilwinning whose records go " as far back as to the 
end of the fifteenth century." At p. 58, he says, 
"The principles of the (Masonic) order were even 
imported into Scotland, where they continued, for 
many ages, in their primitive simplicity, long after 
they had been extinguished in the continental king- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 101 

doms. In this manner, Scotland became the centre 
from which these principles again issued, to illumi- 
nate, not only the nations on the continent, but every 
civilized portion of the habitable globe." In proof 
of these statements the author refers the reader to the 
year 1140, in the Statistical Account of Scotland, Vol. 
XI, Parish of Kilwinning; or Edinburgh Magazine 
for April, 1802, p. 243. 

Who originated the British Women's Temperance 
Association ? Let the following obituary notice of 
November, 1896, tell : 

DEATH OF A WELL= KNOWN LADY TEMPEEANCE 
ORGANIZER. 

" Mrs. Margaret E. Parker, who for many years had 
taken a leading part in the temperance movement 
amongst women, died in Dundee on Sunday the 8th 
inst. The deceased lady had the distinction of being 
the founder of the British Woman's Temperance As- 
sociation. She w^as the first president. Since the 
time of her election the association has steadily pro- 
gressed, until at the present time it has a member- 
ship of upwards of 100,000. The present president, 
it may be mentioned, is Lady Henry Somerset. As 
long ago as 1877 Mrs. Parker was elected president 
of the International Temperance Union at ' the 
World's Convention in America, and only recently 
she returned from California, where she had de- 
livered many lectures and organized a large number 
of temperance societies. She was well known in 
Dundee as an energetic worker and a forcible speaker. 
She was seventy^four years of age." 



102 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 
THE Y. M. C. A. 

Where and by whom did Young Men's Christian 
Associations originate ? England claims something 
of the kind in 1844, but Scotland claims the true 
origin twenty years before that date, namely, in 1828. 

Here are the facts of the case. 

The Encjjdopedki of Missions, published by Funk 
& Wagnals, New York, says that young men's mutual 
improvement societies have existed in almost every 
age of the church, yet they seemingly were nearly, 
if not altogether extinct, when David Nasmyth, a 
native of Glasgow, between 1823 and 1888, formed 
seventy young men's societies in as many cities of 
the United kingdoms, and in France, and America. 
As the oldest, the j)resent Glasgow association, traces 
its origin to a Nasmyth society, formed in 1824; so 
also may be traced the associations elsewhere either 
directly or indirectly to the same source. The 
honour of the development of the associations, as we 
now see them, is due, however, to George Williams 
of London, who in June 6th, 1844, formed them into 
a union of \vorld=wide extent. David Nasmyth was, 
nevertheless, the pioneer of this influential union for 
the temporal and spiritual welfare of young men 
throughout the world. 

CITY MISSIONS. 

And who originated Citi) Missions, in modern 
times, those widespread and efficient means of 
reaching and rescuing the morally depraved, poor 
and outcast of our large cities? It was David 
Nasmyth. After he had established the city mission 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 103 



DAVID NASMYTH. 



lOi SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

in Glasgow, Dublin, and other Irish towns, and in 
the City of New York, he was encouraged by a few 
Irish ladies to go to England and begin the good 
work in the slums of London. The magazine called 
Good Woi'ds, for 1891, tells how the young Scotch- 
man, a stranger in the great city, in the year 1885, at 
first called upon the Bishop of London and the most 
prominent ministers of the leading dissenting bodies, 
appealing to them to co=operate with him and with 
each other in his grand design. But his appeals 
were without success. He was told in effect that in 
the then state of religious feeling it was most unlikely 
that such a person as he should ever succeed in carry- 
ing out so gigantic a scheme. But they knew not their 
man. He found two or three humble men, like him- 
self, in faith, zeal, and courage, and the London City 
Mission, though small, was an acomplished fact. It 
grew, and flourished, and has now, in London, five 
hundred missionaries, whose influence for good 
among thieves, black legs, fallen women, and ruffians 
in London's dens of iniquity no human mind can 
estimate. These missionaries not infrequently 
insulted and maltreated have, while following 
Nasmyth's example, often risked their lives by going 
where no jpoliceman would dare to go unaccompanied. 
Let the following bare outline of their work in Lon- 
don during the jjast year (1890) give some idea of 
their extensive usefulness. They paid 3,600,000 
visits or calls; distributed 5,000,000 tracts; read to 
841,000 people portions of the Scriptures; reclaimed 
2,500 drunkards; and induced 5,500 people to 
attend church, and as many children to attend 
Sunday-school. All that in one year! Who then 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 105 

can estimate the work and the results of the London 
City Mission during the fifty years of its existence, 
or since David Nasmyth began it? Add to all this 
the past fifty years' similar work and results of the 
City Missions, not only in London, but also in Glas- 
gow, Dublin, New York and in other centres of great 
population, then we may well say that the sum of 
David Nasmyth's influence for good reflects honour 
on the country which gave him birth, and is another 
illustration of Scotland's share in enlightening and 
civilizing the world, 

boys' brigades. 

Who has not heard, at least in the British Isles, of 
the Boys Brigade? The same volume of Good 
Words tells us all about it. It is the missing link 
between the Sunday=scliool and such societies as 
Church Guilds, Young Men's Christian Associations, 
Willing Workers, etc. Professor H. Drummond calls 
it " a very great invention." Its object is to gather 
boys of a certain age, say between twelve and fifteen 
years; not only the street arabs, the waifs, and gamins, 
but also boys of a better class who refuse to attend 
Sunday-school, and have got beyond parental control, 
and are acquiring vicious habits. In the Brigade the 
boys are dressed and drilled like soldiers. They are 
not taught the art of war, but self = respect, reverence 
for superiors, order, obedience. Christian truth, and 
manliness. Where did the Brigade begin? and who 
invented it? It began in Glasgow: and its inventor 
was William A. Smith a genuine Scotchman of that 
city. It began in 1883 or 1884, with one company, 
three officers, and thirty boys. Now (in 1890) it has 



106 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

overrun Britain and Ireland, having 483 companies, 
1,370 officers, and 18,052 boys; besides seven companies 
in the United States, three in Canada, and one in 
South Africa. Who can imagine the amount of 
good the Brigade has done during the past eight 
years in rescuing boys from vice, crime, and moral 
ruin? 

FIRE BRIGADES. 

Who has been the great organizer and driller of 
the modern fire companies or brigades? Mr. Braid- 
wood, a native of Edinburgli; a man combining 
genius, caution, and great jDersonal courage. In 1824 
he entered the police force in Edinburgh and organ- 
ized a regular fire brigade. In 1832 he published a 
pamphlet on " the causes and means of extinguishing 
fires," which gave him more than local celebrity, and 
led to his removal to London, where he did good 
work until his melancholy death in discharge of his 
duty. 

It is a mark of good intellect to attend to small as 
well as great things. Scotland has done so in her 
inventions. 

Who invented watches? Says the Church Herald, 
February 24, 1870: 

" The invention of watches had preceded by a few 
years, that of small clocks. Our ideas of a ijrimitive 
watch are always associated with a turnip; but it was 
not until the seventeenth century, when Graham, the 
Scotchman, invented the cylindrical escapement, that 
watches assumed this respectable but inconvenient 
shape. Popular tradition ascribes the invention of 
watches to Peter Hele, of Nurenberg, in the year 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 107 

1490. But then it is a notorious fact that King Rob- 
ert, of Scotland, possessed one, so far back as the 
year 1810, i. c, 180 years earlier. The only way in 
which we can account for this discrepancy, says the 
Herald, is by the supposition that watches were 
originally invented by a Scotchman, but that the 
maker died suddenly without promulgating his 
secret. It is but just to notice, that Graham, the 
great horologist, although having a very Scotch 
name, is said by Beeton to have been born in Cum- 
berland. 

Who invented the kaleidoscope? Sir David 
Brewster of Edinburgh in 1814, and perfected it in 
1817. 

Who invented the stereoscope? Haydn says 
that the " the first was constructed and exhibited by 
Professor Charles Wheatstone in 1838.'" Beeton, with 
more justice, says: "The question whether or not Sir 
David Brewster was the discoverer of the stereoscope 
has given rise to considerable controversy, that hon- 
our being also claimed by Professor Wheatstone." 
One thing is certain, Brewster, by using lenses, instead 
of Wheatstone's mirrors, has made the instrument 
the popular thing we now have. 

Sir David Brewster; inquiring into the history of 
the stereoscope, finds that its fundamental principle 
was well known even to Euclid; that it was distinctly 
described by Galen 1,500 years ago; and that Giamba- 
tista Porta had in 1599 given such a complete drawing 
of the two separate pictures as seen by each eye, and 
of the combined picture placed between them, that 
we recognize in it not only the principle, but the con- 
struction of the stereoscope. 



CHAPTER XI. 



ELECTRICITY. 

Electricity has become a prominent element in 
modern civilization. Let us see what share Scotland 
has had in the matter. 

Who invented what is called the Voltaic pile or 
battery? It gets its name from Alessandro Volta, of 
Como. Volta was, indeed, an inventor of the bat- 
tery; but not the only, and certainly not the first 
inventor of it. For, in the year 1793, after Galvani's 
discoveries, " Many publications followed " says the 
Ency. Brit. Diss, vi, Ed. 8th, p. 963; "one of which by 
Dr. Fowler of Edinburgh, (afterwards of Salisbury) 
is remarkable as containing a letter by Professor 
John Robison, who first thought of increasing the 
efPect of heterogeneous contact by using a nnmher 
of pieces of zinc made of the size of a shilling 
mciking them up into a rouleciu with as many shil- 
lings. We have here, says the Encyclopedia, un- 
questionably the first idea of the pile, which moreover 
was actually constructed. This was in May, 1793," 
whereas, "the date of Volta's discovery of the prin- 
ciple of the i)ile appears to be August, 1796 " — that is, 
three years after Professor Robison of Edinburgh 
had already discovered it. Ibid, p. 964. 

108 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD lO'J 
THE TELEGRAPH. 

Who invented the electric telegraph? Of course 
there are several claimants. There are different forms 
of the telegrai)h; but the chief part of the invention 
is the transmission of thought to a distance by means 
of electricity. There are as claimants: Levi Burrell, 
Milwaukee, 1827; Francis Konalds, England, 1828; 
Le Sage, in France, 1744. Gauss and Weber in 1833 
or 1834; Wheatstone and Morse in about 1837. But 
the true inventor lived, and published his invention at 
least twenty years before the earliest of these claim- 
ants; and he was a Scot. His claim to the original in- 
vention is admitted by all true scientists. The follow- 
ing from the Toronto Globe of January 20, 1857, tells 
the story; and cannot well be abridged on account of 
the importance of the subject. The introductory 
letter of inquiry is evidently from the pen of our 
late Brother Scot, and most general writer, the Rev. 
Mr. McGeorge, editor of the Strcetsville Review, and 
known all over Canada and elsewhere as " Solomon." 

ANTICIPATION OF THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH. 

To the Editor of the Globe. 

" Sir: — In an interesting article in Saturday's Globe, 
you mention that a writer in " Notes and Queries " 
alludes to a communication in the Scofs Magazine 
dated Renfrew, February 1, 1753, in which the 
author, who merely indicates himself by the initials 
' C. M.,' not merely ' suggests electricity as a medium 
for conveying messages and signals, but details with 
singular minuteness the method of opening and 
maintaining lingual communication between remote 



110 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

points, a method which, with only a few improve- 
ments, has now been so eminently successful.' And 
you add—' Should any of our friends chance to be 
possessed of the Scofs Magazine referred to in the 
immediately preceding paragraph, we should like to 
be furnished with a copy of C M.'s paper. It would 
be singular enough to be certiorated that the method 
of discovering the electric telegraph, is due to a deni- 
zen of the West of Scotland.' 

"The letter you allude to is republished in the North 
British Reiieiv for February, 1855, and fully justifies 
the claim set up on behalf of the writer, that the 
Electric Telegraph, perhaps the greatest marvel of 
the present age, was really discovered by a Scotch- 
man more than a century ago, although for reasons 
which cannot now be ascertained, the discovery was 
allowed to lie dormant till a much later period. The 
letter is entitled, "An Expeditious Method of Con- 
veying Intelligence," and is as follows: 

"Kenfkew, Feb. 1, 1753. 

"Sir. — It is well known to all who are conversant 
in electrical experiments, that the electrical power 
may be propagated along a small wire from one place 
to another without being sensibly abated by the 
length of its progress. Let, then, a set of wires 
equal in number to the letters of the alphabet be 
extended horizontally between two given places par- 
allel to one another, and each of them about an inch 
distant from that next to it. At every twenty yards' 
end let them be fixed on glass with jewelers' cement 
to some firm body, both to prevent them from touch- 
ing the earth, or any other non-electric, and from 
breaking by their own gravity. Let the electric gun- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 111 

barrel be placed at right angles with the extremities 
of the wires, and about an inch below them. Also, 
let the wires be fixed in a solid piece of glass six 
inches from the end, and let all that part of them 
which reaches from the glass to the machine have 
sufficient spring and stiifness to recover its situation 
after being brought in contact with the barrel. Close 
by the sujDporting glass, let a ball be suspended from 
every wire, and about a sixth or an eighth of an inch 
below the .balls; place the letters of the alphabet 
marked on bits of paper, or any other substance that 
may be light enough to rise to the electrified ball, and 
at the same time let it be so contrived that each of 
them may reassume its proper place when dropped. 
All things constructed as above, and the minute pre- 
viously fixed, I begin the conversation with my dis- 
tant friend in this manner. Having set the electrical 
machine going as in ordinary experiments, suppose I 
am to pronounce the word Sir, with a piece of glass 
or any other electric per se. I strike the wire S so 
as to bring it in contact with the barrel, then i, then 
r, all in the same way; and my correspondent almost 
in the same instant observes those several characters 
rise in order to the electrified balls at his end of the 
wires. Thus I spell away as long as I think fit, and 
my correspondent, for the sake of memory, writes the 
characters as they rise, and may join and read them 
afterwards as often as he inclines. Upon a signal 
given or from choice I. stop the machine, and taking 
up the pen in my turn, I write down at the other end 
whatever my friend strikes out. 

"If anybody should think this way tiresome, let 
him, instead of the balls, suspend a range of bells 



112 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

from the roof equal in number to the letters of the 
alphabet, gradually decreasing in size from the bell 
A to bell Z, and from the horizontal wire let there be 
another set reaching to the several bells, one viz., 
from the horizontal wire A to the bell A, another 
from the horizontal wire B to the bell B, etc. Then 
let him who begins the discourse bring the wire in 
contact with the barrel as before, and the electrical 
spark working on bells of different sizes, will inform 
the correspondent by the sound what wires have been 
touched, and thus by some practice they may come 
to understand the language of the chimes in whole 
words, without being put to the trouble of noting 
down every letter. 

" The same thing may be otherwise effected. Let 
the balls be suspended over the characters as before, 
but instead of bringing the ends of the horizontal 
wires in contact with the barrel, let a second set 
reach from the electrified cask (barrel) so as to be in 
contact with the horizontal ones ; and let it be so 
contrived at the same time, that any of them may be 
removed from its corresponding horizontal by the 
slightest touch, and may bring itself again in contact 
when left at liberty. This may be done by the help 
of a small spring and slider, or twenty other methods, 
which the least ingenuity will discover. In this way 
the characters will always adhere to the balls except- 
ing when any one of the secondaries is removed from 
contact with its horizontal, aiKl then the letter at the 
other end of the horizontal will immediately drop 
from its ball. But I mention this only by way of 
variety. 

" Some may perhaps think that, although the elec- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 113 

trie fire has not been observed to diminish sensibly 
in its progress through any length of wire that 
has been tried hitherto, yet, as that has never ex- 
ceeded thirty or forty yards, it may be readily sup- 
posed that in a far greater length it would be remark- 
ably diminished and probably would be entirely 
drained off in a few miles by the surrounding air. To 
prevent the objection, and save longer argument, lay 
over the wires from one end to the other with a thin 
coat of jeweler's cement. This may be done for a 
trifle of additional expense; and, as it is an electric 
per se, will effectually secure any part of the wire 
from mixing with the atmosphere. 

" I am, &c. ' C. M.' " 

" The ingenious Renfrew man is, beyond a doubt, 
the true inventor of the electric telegraph and the 
Morse and House telegraphs now in operation are 
merely improvements on his idea, better adapting it 
to the commercial and social requirements of the age. 
A telegraph, constructed in precise conformity with 
C. M.'s instructions, would be found to convey intelli- 
gence certainly and expeditiously, although not equal 
in value for practical purposes to some of the modern 
imiarovements. But one almost regrets that for the 
beautiful chime of bells, conveying the thoughts of 
the distant correspondent, described by C M. in his 
second paragraph, should be substituted the monoto- 
nous and unideal ' click, click,' which constitute the 
only vocal utterances of our telegraph of the present 
day." Ed. 

C. M.'s letter attracted the attention of Sir David 
Brewster, and in the life of that eminent scientist 
there is an explanation of how the identity of C. M. 



114 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

was discovered. From this it appears that the writer 
of the letter was Charles Morrison, a native of Green- 
ock, who had been bred a surgeon, but was understood 
to be connected with the tobacco trade in Glasgow. 
He was known to be able to transmit messages along 
wires by means of electricity, and his neighbours at 
Renfrew regarded him as a sort of a wizard. Mr. 
Morrison, it is added, was obliged, or found it con- 
venient, to leave Renfrew, and settle in Virginia, 
where he died. 

It is a matter of surprise to some who know the 
history of the telegraph that Morse should be re- 
garded as its inventor, and that a monument ascrib- 
ing that honour to him should be proposed to be 
erected to him at Washington. A strong protest by 
some American writer appeared in the public prints 
some time ago, against that proposal; and seemingly 
with justice, not only from what has now been adduced 
concerning the Renfrew man, but also from other 
considerations. For iiistance, the Popular Science 
Monthlu, for June, 1880, says: "The name of Profes- 
sor Henry of Princeton, N. J. is not among those who 
are associated in the popular mind with the electric 
telegraph, and yet without his discoveries the electro- 
magneto telegraph could not exist." "Professor 
Taylor, who was for many years connected with the 
Patent office, states ' that the work for which Morse 
gets the credit is, in all its more important features, 
the work of another man, Alfred Vail, who, with Dr. 
Gale, was associated with Morse in perfecting the in- 
vention. The Morse alphabet and the instrument that 
was found in practice to work were both the sole inven- 
tions of Mr. Vail.' No Henry, no Morse telegraph." 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE JN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 115 

In the Toronto Ifail and Emjrire of May 22, 1897, 
is the following notice of astounding sub=niarine tele- 
graphic achievement. 

"Giiglielmo Marconi, a young Italian student, 
twenty=tliree years of age, is now at Cardiff, in Wales, 
fixing electrical communication with Westonisuper= 
Mare across the Bristol Channel, by means of the 
new telegraphy without wires, of which he is the in- 
ventor. Twelve months ago this electrical genius 
went to England with his discovery, and gave a prac- 
tical exhibition of its possibilities at Salisbury, in 
Wiltshire, by holding conversation between two 
points seven miles ajmrt without a wire. The electric- 
al waves utilized to transmit the signals require no 
wires, cables, nor metallic strijjs as a conducting path, 
and brook the restraint of no intervening obstacles. 
They penetrate right through walls of stone and steel, 
through hills and houses, they pursue a direct course 
from leaving the transmitter until reaching the re- 
ceiver, and by means of the ordinary Morse tele- 
graphic alphabet tell the message they bear. In the 
opinion of experts, Marconi has made a discovery 
worthy of this great century, and wrested from nature 
a priceless secret. 

But Scotland was able to do the same thing more 
than thirty years before Marconi was born; as the 
following question and answer may prove: 

Who first discovered the electric light and invented 
the submarine telegraph? Let the Toronto Globe 
already mentioned, tell. (January 26, 1857.) 

A TRANSMARINE TELEGRAPH, AND ELECTRIC LIGHT. 

"In the same article in the North British, is an illu= 



116 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

sion to an interesting telegraphic project, wliicli has 
another ingenious Scotchman for its author. 

" ' A new princijale of telegraphic communication 
if it shall iDrove of practical value, may render such 
an enterprise [an Americo-European Telegraph] 
within the reach even of the western states of 
Europe. The idea of what may provisionally be called 
a transmarine telegraph has been recently brought 
forward by Mr. Lindsay of Dundee. This plan is to 
send the electric current through great distances of 
water by means of long lines of wire, stretching along 
the opposite shores. These lines communicate with 
a powerful battery, and their four terminations dip 
into the sea, so that the electric currents flow in two 
different directions across the ocean. Mr. Lindsay 
has made experiment on a small scale in Scot- 
land, which so far confirmed his views; but he re- 
peated them on a larger scale last summer at 
Portsmouth, where he sent messages through a mile 
of water, though there were many ships in the inter- 
vening space, and many of them with copi^ered bot- 
toms. In this experiment the length of the lateral 
wires were less than half a mile. We understand 
that a i>itent has been secured by a Company who in- 
tend in the sj)ring to make experiments on a great scale.' 

" The idea of a trans marine telegraph suggested 
itself to Mr. Lindsay a number of years ago. I had 
the pleasure of spending an evening with him in the 
autumn of 1845, when a large portion of the con- 
versation turned on this very scheme. Only a day or 
two before he had made his first successful experi- 
ment, in transmitting electricity across a sheet of 
water in the neighborhood of Dundee, without the 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 111 

use of n connecting wire, and he was then very san- 
guine as to the practicability of a transmarine tele- 
graph across the English channel — the idea of tele- 
graphic communication not having been mooted at 
that period. But, until the paragraph quoted above 
from the North British Review came under my 
notice, I had supposed that in the multiislicity of 
other avocations, Mr. Lindsay had discontinued his 
telegraphic experiments. The hours he could spare 
from his fatiguing duties as teacher in the Dundee 
Gaol, were devoted to the Herculean task of prepar- 
ing a polyglot dictionary of fifty languages, with all 
of which he had made himself more or less ac- 
quainted. I believe he is the only individual in 
Great Britain who possesses a copy of the whole 
works of Confucius in the original Chinese, and more 
than that is able to read them. A second copy is in 
the British Museum, but not, it is said, in any pri- 
vate library. He was at the same time engaged in 
an interesting experiment, having for its object to 
ascertain the degree of instruction of which convicts 
who had grown up in vice and ignorance were capa- 
ble. Some of these while serving their term of im- 
prisonment in Dundee Gaol, Mr. Lindsay succeeded 
in initiating into the mysteries of the Integral and 
DifPerential Calculus, and qualified them for working 
out some of the most difficult calculations embodied 
yearly in the Nautical Almanac. He was occupied 
also with a controversy, in which he claimed that he 
was the first discoverer of Electric Light, having had 
his house lighted up with it for years, and of this he 
brought forward such cogent proofs as finally silenced 
the rival claimants of the distinction. With so much 



118 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

on his hands, it is not surprising, although it may 
be a matter of regret, that he has not found time to 
prosecute his scheme of a transmarine telegraph, with 
the energy which its importance demands if it is 
really practicable as the experiments so far seem to 
indicate that it is. If you or any of your correspon- 
dents can supply any information as to what became 
of the projected company, who were * to make experi- 
ments on a great scale,' it would be in a high degree 
interesting." Yours, etc., 

SOOTUS. 

Toronto, January 22, 1857. 



CHAPTER XII. 

WHO WAS THE CABLE KING? 




SIR JOHN PENDEK. 



" Sir John Pender, whose death at the age of 80 
years we recently announced, was widely known as 

119 



120 SCOTLAND'S SRARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

' the Cable King,' When the project for laying the 
first Atlantic cable was originated he was one of the 
345 subscribers who contributed i- 1,000 each towards 
the undertaking. But that was only an earnest of 
the faith he had in the success of ocean telegraphy. 
The time came when there was a financial crisis. 
After the breaking of the first cable the Gutta Percha 
Company hesitated about the making of another 
without a very substantial guarantee. It was then, 
as has been said, then Sir John Pender's genius rose 
to heroism. ' What amount of guarantee do you re- 
quire?' he asked; and the answer being a quarter of 
a million sterling, he said, ' Will you take my per- 
sonal guarantee for that amount?' 'Yes.' 'Well, 
you have it,' he replied, and the bargain was closed. 
After seeing the Atlantic cable successfully estab- 
lished Sir John devoted himself sedulously to the 
organization and development of cables in the Med- 
iterranean, and to India, China, Australia, South Af- 
rica, and elsewhere, the result being the construction 
of a world system, of which the American ca- 
ble is now but a segment. Born in the Vale of 
Leven, not far from the birthplace of Tobias Smollett, 
he began life, after receiving an ordinary school edu- 
cation, by serving in the office of one of the print- 
works there. Thence he went to Glasgow, and grad- 
ually developed into a merchant of the typical Scotch 
kind. He also acquired large business interests in 
Manchester, and had made a fortune entitling him to 
retirement before the cable enterprises were ever 
entered on. He had a seat in Parliament off and on 
for considerably over thirty j^ears, the greater part of 
the time as Member for the Wick Burghs." «4M£k. J 5 ijj 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 121 
THE EARTH CIRCUIT. 

Who first discov(n'ed and demonstrated tJie earth 
circuit in connection with the electric telegraph? It 
was Alexander Bain, a Scot. The Encyclopedia says 
that "Mr, Steiuheil, in 1838, more than suspected 
such a circuit," but from some cause or other it ob- 
tained little publicity. A most ingenius artist, Mr. 
Bain, established for himself the principle, and pro- 
claimed its application somewhat later. And what 
was the result of its application? It reduced the 
double wire of the telegraph to one, the earth answer- 
ing for the other. 

The following obituary notice of Mr. Bain ap- 
peared in the Scottish American Journal, February 
1, 1877: 

" Mr. Alex. Bain, the electrician, has died in the 
new Home for Incurables, at Broomhill, Kirkintil- 
loch. Mr. Bain was a native of Thurso, and was 
sixty^six years of age. He was the inventor of the 
electro=chemical printing telegraph, the electro=mag- 
netic clock, and of perforated paper for automatic 
transmission of messages, and was author of a num- 
ber of books and pamphlets relating to these sub- 
jects." 

Who is acknowledged to be the prime projector 
and chief promoter of the telegraphic communica- 
tion between Canada and the Australian Colonies, 
through the Pacific Ocean; and which, in con- 
nexion with the new fast Atlantic steamers, the 
Atlantic Cable between Ireland and Nova Scotia, 
and the Canadian Pacific Railway, is destined to 
revolutionize and vastly improve, in the near fu- 



122 SCOTLAND'S SHARE W CIVILI2W0 TBE WORLD 

ture, the style and volume of intercolonial busi- 
ness, and at the same time afford a speedier and 
safer means of communication between Britain and 
her eastern and western dependencies in times of 
both ipeace and war? It is Mr. Sanford Fleming, 
born at Kirkaldy in Fifeshire. The Toronto Emjnre 
of March 21, 1894, says: 

" Mr. Sanford Fleming, formerly engineer^in=chief 
to the Canadian Pacific Railway, must be credited with 
the principal share in the work of forming opinion 
upon this question. At the Colonial Conference of 
1887 he advocated what was then a novel and rather 
startling idea. He has since that time been inde- 
fatigable in marshaling facts and arguments in sup- 
port of schemes for bringing Canada and the Aus- 
tralian colonies into closer connection; and it was a 
memorandum drawn up by him that Mr. Mackenzie 
Bowell, in his tour last year through the Australian 
colonies, submitted to the different Governments as 
a definite basis of discussion." 

THE TELEPHONE. 

Who invented the electric telejDhone — that un- 
speakably useful instrument by which we can speak to 
our distant friends even many miles away, and which 
saves commercial and other people so much writing, 
time and tramping through our cities and towns? 
It was Alexander G. Bell, a Scot. 

The following is his own description of the process 
of the invention, as quoted in the Halton Neivs, 
October, 1883: 

DISCOVERY OF THE TELEPHONE. 

"Was the invention of the telephone the result of 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 123 

a deliberate research and experiment for that pur- 
pose, or was it a discovery rather than a creation? 

" It was the result of long and patient study of two 
distinct lines of thought which finally blended in one, 
producing the telephone. I had for a long time 
studied the subject of speech and the organs by 
which it is produced, as had my father before me, 
and in doing so conceived the idea of producing arti- 
ficial sounds by a certain system. I came to Canada 
for my health, I am a native of Scotland, you know, 
and while studying electricity in the woods there, 
and on regaining my lost health I was called by the 
officials of the Boston schools to introduce a new 
system of teaching them to speak. I had long be- 
lieved it possible to teach the deaf the use of the 
mouth and organs of speech, and had demonstrated it 
in some degree, and gladly accepted the opportunity 
of putting the system into practical operation. I 
undertook the work, keeping up, however, my study 
of electricity and its application to sound production, 
working late at night after other people were at rest. 
In the course of my efforts to demonstrate to the 
deaf how the sound waves affect the hearing ear I 
made use of a little instrument with a membranous 
diaphragm which responded to the sound waves. I 
conceived the idea of writing those sound waves on 
smoked glass so they might be read. Continuing the 
experiment still further, I obtained a human ear, 
and found by speaking into it I could produce simi- 
lar but more satisfactory results, a little bone in the 
ear being moved by the vibration of the ear drum 
and writing the sound waves on the glass. All this 
time I was continuing my experiments with sound 



124 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

and the application of electricity to its production. 
I had succeeded in a considerable degree, when sud- 
denly the idea of connecting the two successful ex- 
periments occurred to me, and I did so, attaching the 
ear to the instrument by which the sounds were pro- 
duced, and I had the telephone. The remainder was 
only a matter of detail. The two lines of thought 
and investigation which I had followed so long and 
patiently blended there, and the result was the tele- 
phone." 

And who invented visible speech — that universal 
alphabet by which not only people who can see and 
hear, but even the deaf and dumb, can pronounce any 
language and any dialect of the world? It was An- 
drew Melville Bell, father of the inventor of the tele- 
phone. (See Scribner^s Magazine for October, 1892.) 

THE RADIOPHONE. 

Who invented the radiophone, one of the marvel- 
lous triumphs of modern science, by which human 
speech can be sent long distances through a ray of 
light instead of over an electrified wire? It was the 
same Scotch genius who invented the telephone — Pro- 
fessor Alexander Graham Bell. 

THE FIRST ELECTRIC CAR. 

" Who first attempted locomotion by electrical 
power? In the year 1830 Professor Salvatore da 
Negro, of Padua, produced, but on a very small scale, 
oscillating and rotary motion by means of electricity. 
Then followed a variety of experimenters and invent- 
ors, chiefly German, whose aim was the propulsion 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 125 

of carriages by the same mysterious force, the most 
successful experiment being that of Siemens and 
Halske of Berlin in 1879. But about forty years be- 
fore that date we find the following facts given in 
Pepper's Cyclopedia of Science simplified. He says: 
'Davidson in 1837 placed an electro= magnetic loco- 
motive on the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway. The 
carriage was fifteen feet long, six feet broad, and 
weighed about five tons, with all the arrangements 
and apparatus on board for producing electricity, but 
when j)ut in motion a speed of only four miles an 
hour could be obtained.' No wonder so heavy a 
carriage went so slowly as comjjared with the motor 
electric cars. It had no powerful primary dynamo 
on the roadside to supply and feed it with the electric 
motive power. It supplied its own electricity. The 
wonder is it went at all. But it did go, and was 
doubtless the forerunner of all the electric cars and 
carriages of the j)resent day, and of the future ages 
while such vehicles continue to run. 

" N. B. — The foregoing statements are of course 
subject to correction. Any earlier valid claim to the 
invention will be cheerfully acknowledged. Honour 
to whom honour is due." 

COMPRESSED AIR MOTOR. 

Who is the inventor of the air motor? The answer 
is given by the Scottish American, of September 16, 
1896. 

" Mr. Robert Hardie, inventor of the air motor which 
has been adopted on some of the road car lines in 
this city, and which is expected to bring about a 
revolution in the motive power for operating urban 



126 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

and suburban railways, is a native of Edinburgh. He 
was born in 1846." 

Other Scotch inventions might be noted, but let 
those already mentioned suffice to show that Scotland 
has had a large share in the mechanical and electrical 
devices of a practical kind, by which this age is dis- 
tinguished. 

We have lingered too long, perhaps, among Scotch 
materialities. Let us gradually ascend to something 
higher. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



SCOTCH PHYSIQUE AND OATMEAL. 

Whence come the pluck, the energy, the intellectu- 
ality of the Scottish character? " A sound mind in a 
sound body " are undoubtedly requisites for such a 
character. Without a sound body, including a well= 
nourished brain and muscle, we cannot expect either 
physical or mental energy. Oats have had much to 
do with Scotch character. Many a bright Scotch 
genius has " cultivated literature on a little oatmeal," 
notwithstanding the disparaging joke of the Rev. 
Sydney Smith; and some of the greatest athletes in 
the world owe their muscular strength under God, to 
having been fed very much on the same simple, sensi- 
ble, and most nutritious diet— oatmeal and milk. 
Says the Scottish American Journal of October 11, 
1888: " There is what is termed the Anthropometric 
Committee of the British Association." From that 
committee's report we learn that the average height 
of Scotchmen is 68.61 inches, or nearly five feet, nine 
inches; of Irishmen 67.90 inches; of Englishmen 
67.86 inches and of Welshmen 66.65 inches. 

There are ninety men in the Scots Guards averag. 
ing six feet two and a half inches in height. Not 
one is under six feet, and twelve are six feet four 
inches. Toronto Empire, February 21, 1894. 

127 



128 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Then the averaere weight of full-grown Scotchmen 
is 165.3 pounds; of Englishmen 155 pounds; of Irish- 
men 154.1 pounds. " Beef=eating Englishmen " says 
the Scotch editor, " had better turn to the halesome 
parritch, wale of Scotia's food." Yes, oatmeal and 
lively, pleasant, out-door games have had much to do 
in forming Scotch character. From whence have we 
the roarin', general winter game of curling and the 
most popular summer game of golf? Both from 
auld Scotia w^iere they have been played during hun- 
dreds of years past. 

During the last twenty years Scotland has had 
reason to be proud of her record in foot=ball matches 
against England, Wales, Ireland and Canada. Games 
played, forty=five; won, thirty=five. And in the recent 
great international game of " Tug o' war," between 
Americans, Irish, Danes, Germans, Italians and 
Canadians, " the Scotch were awarded the first 
prize, with six successive victories and no defeats." 
The oatmeal did it. 

Well, that was the animal strength; but physiolo- 
gists and chemists tell us that our brains require 
phosphorus, and that there is more of that substance 
in oatmeal than in any other kind of grain in com- 
mon use. 

" The average weight of a Scotchman's brain is sixty 
ounces, and Englishman's forty=nine, a Frenchman's 
a little over forty-five." ScoUishAmerican Journal, 
June 29, 1891. 

It is not a matter of surprise, therefore, that 
Scotchmen should resemble their unicorn in having 
superior brain power, or rather a good organ for the 
exercise of mentality. But this mentality or intel- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 129 

lectuality must be properly instructed and influenced 
by Christian truth and the grace of God to iDroduce 
the genuine Scottish character. All who know the 
history and character of the nation know that its 

MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL CHARACTER IS DUE TO THE 
CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 

It is said that Christianity was introduced A. D. 
201, in the reign of Donald I. We know for certain 
that St. Ninian laboured as a Missionary in Grallo- 
way in the fourth century, and built the famous 
stone church called Candida Casa. In one of the 
windows of the venerable cathedral of Glasgow, is a 
picture of St. Mungo bidding welcome to the famous 
Irish Missionary, St. Columba, who made lona the 
headquarters of his missionary operations in the 
sixth century. But this mission of Columba was 
the result of St. Patrick having carried the Christian 
faith from Scotland to Ireland about a hundred years 
before Columba was born. Provided that St. Patrick 
was a Scot, we find that the Scottish jjeople were 
early under the influence of the Christian religion 
and ever since shoM'ed their zeal in building expensive 
places of worship. We find the Scottish army, at 
Bannockburn in 1314, down on their knees in prayer, 
before the battle. 

And when John Knox, that good, honest, fearless 
man, arrived in Scotland (himself a Scot), he found 
the people in religious zeal and intelligence, ready to 
co=operate with him in the reformation of religion, 
of which there was great need at the time. By the 
establishment of parish schools, he greatly in- 



130 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IX CI VILIZIXG THE WORLD 

creased the secular and religious knowledge of the 
kingdom. If his wise and patriotic plan of dividing 
the vast wealth of the church had been carried into 
eJ3Pect, namely, one4hird for the support of colleges 







JOHN KNOX. 



and schools, one=third for the support of the poor, 
and the remaining third for the support of the Chris- 
tian ministry, both the schools and colleges of Scot- 
land would have been richly endowed, her ministers 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 131 

well supported, and her church fabrics, especially 
in rural districts, more in accordance with Christian 
decency and order. But Knox's patriotic plan was 
ridiculed, thwarted, and almost nullified by the land 
grabbing, tythe and rent grabbing nobility and gen- 
try of the time. Knox himself says of them: " Some 
were licentious, some had greedily gripped the pos- 
sessions of the church, and others thought that they 
would not lack their part of Christ's coat." (See 
Hetherington's History of the Church of Scotland, 
pp. 47, 50, 53.) Yet despite this wholesale plunder 
of church property by the avaricious reforming 
aristocracy and lairds, Knox's parish schools, and 
half=starved dominies, and pitifully endowed colleges 
have done wonders for the intellectual and moral 
condition of the Scottish people. That condition 
has in some respects been changed " for better or 
worse" during the past fifty or sixty years by the 
influx of other nationalities, and by other circum- 
stances; but all that has hitherto been praiseworthy 
in the national character may be traced to the bless- 
ing of God on Bible training in the parish schools, 
the exposition of the Scriptures by lectures in the 
pulpit, and on the reverent reading of " the big ha' 
Bible " at home. 

" While learning the art of reading, by the Book 
of Proverbs," says Dr. Guthrie, " we had our minds 
stored with the highest moral truths, and by sage 
advices applicable to all the ages and departments of 
life, the branch, while it was supple received a bent 
in a direction highly favourable to future welbdoing 
and success in life. The patience, prudence, fore- 
sight and economy which used to characterize Scotch- 



132 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

men — giving occasion to the saying, 'A canny Scot,' 
and by which they were so often able to rise in the 
world and distance all competitors in the race of life 
— was, to a large extent, due to their being thus in- 
grained in youth and childhood with the practica 
wisdom expressed in the Book of Proverbs." 

Each of the leading religious bodies in Scotland — 
the Established, the Free, and the United Presby- 
terian, and the Episcopal — has its missionaries in 
foreign parts, altogether forming "a grand army" of 
workers for the world's evangelization. Then there 
is the National Bible Society of Scotland, which in 
1891 disseminated outside of the empire, and in the 
colonies, 172,769 Bibles, 189,222 New Testaments, and 
311,026 portions of the Scriptures, 

EDUCATION. 

Who introduced into England, Ireland, Scotland, 
and elsewhere, what is known as the Lancasterian 
system of instruction in public or national schools — 
known also as the monitorial, the Madras, and the 
Bell system? It was not Joseph Lancaster, good 
man, though he did a great work in propagating 
schools on this economic plan of mutual instruction; 
of which schools there have been at one time, " some 
hundreds of them in England, and in London more 
than forty." The honour of introducing them be- 
longs to the Rev. Dr. Andrew Bell, a Scot, born at St. 
Andrews, in 1753. He was a clergyman of the Eng- 
lish church, was in 1789 chaplain of Fort St. George, 
and minister of St. Mary's at Madras, and there in 
superintending the Military Orphan school he adopted 
from the native schools the monitorial system. Bee- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 133 

ton says, "Joseph Lancaster is often said to be the in- 
troducer of this system into England; but the merit is, 
we believe, due to Dr. Bell. He was rewarded for his 
exertions with a prebend's stall in Westminster Abbey, 
and the mastership of Sherburn Hospital Durham. 
He amassed a large fortune, 100,000 pounds of which 
he left for the establishment of schools to be taught on 
the Madras system, and for other charitable^ purposes. 
He died at Cheltenham, June 27, 1832, his remains 
being brought to London, and interred in Westmin- 
ster Abbey, with all the marks of distinction which his 
worth so well merited." _ . 

Who originated the London University, now Uni- 
versity College? Let Beeton answer. Speaking ot 
ThomasCampbellthepoethesays, "Hewastwic^elect- 

ed to the rectorship of Glasgow University ; and took an 
active part in forming the London University now 
University College, which he indeed claimed the 
merit of originating." (See Leisure Hour for 1861, 

^"concerning Normal Schools Chambers's Encyclo- 
pedia says, ''One of the earliest, if not the earhes 
Normal School in Great Britain was the Sessional 
School of Edinburgh (1830); afterwards developed 
into the General Assembly's National Institu ion; 
England followed with the Battersea Training College 
instituted by Rev. J. P. Kay Shuttleworth and Mr^ 
Tuffnal, resulting in 36 Colleges for the training o 
teachers. Glasgow, however, lays claim to have had 
the first real Normal School in Britain. As to the 
Edinburgh Sessional School it was merely monitorial 
or Lancasterian; and as to when it developed into the 
Normal character is not stated. In favour of Glasgow s 



134 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

claim we may well accept the testimony of so good 
and intelligent a man as David Stow, Esq., Honourary 
Secretary of the Glasgow Normal Seminary, and 
author of "Moral Training," "The Training System," 
etc. In his work entitled " Bible Training for Sabbath 
Schools and Week-day Schools " he says distinctly 
that " the Glasgow Normal Seminary was the first 
established in Great Britain." (Page 106, 7th Edi- 
tion, Blackie & Son.) 

WHAT SHARE HAS SCOTLAND IN THE MODERN 
NEWSPAPER? 

The newspaper is now a great educator, both in 
truth and error; and is more read by the busy world 
than books. It is a mighty power in forming public 
opinion — shedding light and darkness; civilizing or 
demoralizing the world of readers. It is pleasing 
therefore to know that the newspaper is so much 
under the control of Scotch common sense and 
moral influence. 

Every large city of Canada, and almost every large 
town has, or has had, its Scotch editor or editors. 
And as for the United States a welhknown Journal 
of New York, speaking of pioneer journalists, says: 
"Newspaper men hailing from Scotland are to be 
found in nearly every city on this continent, and are 
everywhere regarded as among the most valuable 
among those workers who give to American journal- 
ism whatever literary ability it possesses to=day. In 
fact, if the theme were traced to its sources, as it 
might be, it would be found that Scotchmen have 
given to the Press of the United States even all the 
distinctive features on which it now prides itself 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 135 

Even such a characteristically American device as 
disjilay heads over important articles was introduced 
by a Scotchman in Philadelphia, and we are sorry 
to say it, another Scotchman, in Richmond, was the 
first to make a feature of that personal and sensational 
style of newspaper writing on which so many modern 
papers rely for their circulation and other patronage. 
If we wanted to show the services which our country- 
men have rendered to American journalism we could 
point to hundreds of men who have adorned the high- 
est walks of newspaper life." Among the illustrious 
journalistic jjioneers of the United States mentioned 
are George Dawson, born at Falkirk in 1813, editor 
of the Rochester Democrat and Albany Evening 
Journal, James Tytler, a Forfarshire man, editor 
of the Salem, Massachusets, Register, from 1794 till 
his death 1804. He wrote the bulk of the first edition 
of the Encyclopedia Britannica. And still earlier 
John Campbell postmaster and stationer, editor of 
the Boston News Letter, issued in 1704, and which 
retained its vitality against all opposition until 1775. 
But we shall see more of Scottish Journalism when 
we come to speak of the Scot in India. 

THE ROYAL SOCIETY. 

Who was the i^rime mover in the formation of the 
famous Royal Society for the cultivation of science? 
It was Sir Robert Murray, (1600-1G73) son of Sir 
Robert Murray of Craiiie, Ayrshire. "He took a 
prominent i3art in the deliberations of the club in 
London, for the discussion of natural science, called 
' The New Philosophy.' " He obtained a charter for the 
newly organized society: was its first President for 



136 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 

three years in succession; and during his life exerted 
great zeal in extending its influence. (Ency. Brit.) 
In Hamilton's Outlines of the History of England, 
C. XXVI, is the following record: "Charles II. was 
a great patron of learning, and at the suggestion of 
Sir Robert Moray, instituted the Royal Society for 
the cultivation of mathematical and physical re- 
search." 

BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT 
OF SCIENCE. 

And who was it who originated the more modern 
and better known British Association for the advance- 
ment of Science? Let Vol. XIV., p. 277 of the last 
edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica tell. It says, 
"In an article in the Quarterly Review, Sir David 
Brewster threw out a suggestion for an 'Association 
of our nobility, clergy, gentry, and philosophers,' 
which was taken up by and found speedy realization 
in the 'British Association for the advancement of 
Science.' Its fir.-.t meeting was held in York in 1831; 
and Brewster, along wnth Babbage and Herschel, had 
the chief part in shaping its constitution. . . . 
Besides his discoveries in optical science he was the in- 
ventor of the lenticular stereoscope now in use, instead 
of the cumbrous mirror instrument of Wheatstone, the 
kaleidoscope, and dioptric lighthouses, which pre- 
ceded those of Freshnel; so that his successor, the 
head of Edinburgh University, paid a just tribute to 
his memory after his death — ' Every lighthouse that 
burns round the shores of the British Empire is a 
shining witness to the usefulness of Brewster's life. ' " 

A nation's character which is represented emblemat- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 137 

ically, in part, by the unicorn, and by the thistle 
with leaves and flower surrounded with prickles, 
may well be supposed to have somewhat of a logical 
and metaphysical style of thinking— to be observant, 
in fact, of very fine points, princijales, and distinctions 
in abstract truth. And so it is with the cultivated 
Scotch character. 

Who have been the most noted metaphysicians, in 
our day— the men who have explored the faculties 
and illustrated the operations of the human mind? 
Keid, Abercomby, Dugald Stewart, Brown, Sir 
William Hamilton, and George Paxton Young — all 
of them Scots, and whose fame as mental philoso- 
phers has spread far beyond braid Scotland. 

In such a country we might expect some distin- 
guished mathematicians. Scotland has produced a 
fair share of them: but as it is a science which, like 
others, does not show itself except in its results, we 
need only refer to the Scottish civil engineering, 
ship-building, and mechanical inventions, already 
mentioned, all of which required more or less the 
practical application of mathematical science, and 
which go to prove that Scotland is not behind other 
nations in that department of useful knowledge. 
Mathonatics is of supreme importance in making- 
astronomical calculations: and no nation has given 
more ease and comfort to calculating astronomers 
than Scotland. 

Who invented Logarithms? It was Sir John 
Napier, baron of Merchiston, near Edinburgh, about 
the close of the sixteenth century. And what are 
logarithms? Laplace, the great French philosopher 
tells us, they are tables of figures, which, says he, 



138 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

" by reducing to a few days the labour of many 
months, doubles, as it were, the life of an astrono- 
mer, besides freeing him from the errors and disgust 
inseparable from long calculations." 

ASTRONOMY. 

Scotland has not only given to astronomy the ben- 
efit of logarithms but has doubtless made good use 
of them in that sublime science; and has added to 
it other discoveries and inventions in promoting it. 
Thomas Dick, LL. D., " The Christian Philosopher," 
has studied and written largely on " The Solar 
System," and on astronomical instruments. Dr. 
Patrick Wilson, of Glasgow, a practical astronomer, 
was the first to discover that the sun is a dark body 
with a luminous atmosi3liere; and that what we call 
spots on the sun are merely oi)enings in its photo- 
sphere. His discovery was published in an admira- 
ble iDaper in the Pliilosopltieal Transactions for 1774. 
It is to be regretted that Herschel, more than twenty 
years after, when writing on the same subject, did 
not more j)ointedly acknowledge his indebtedness to 
Wilson for the discovery. Dr. Gregory, another prac- 
tical astronomer of Scotland, is celebrated as the in- 
ventor of the reflecting telescope — a most important 
invention. Dr. Gregory's reflecting telescopes are 
famous all over the astronomical world. But says 
Hayden, " The reflecting telescope was invented by 
§ir Isaac Newton in 1668." Others say, in 1671 or 
1672. Yet the same Hayden is telling the honest 
truth when he states, " that Gregory invented the 
reflecting telescope in 1663; and, that, in that year he 
published his invention in a work entitled Optica 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 139 

Promota, which spread his name all over Europe." 
The discrepancy is exjjlained in this way, — Gregory 
although the real inventor, acknowledges that he had 
not the ability to construct the instrument, nor could 
he find an optician who understood how to do it; 
whereas Sir Isaac Newton, who was a practical mech- 
anician, on Gregory's principle "made one with his 
own hands." (See Encyclopedia Britannica.) 

Then we have James Ferguson, " The Peasant Boy 
Philosopher," who rose from being a shepherd boy 
to be a mechanician, a painter, and a high class as- 
tronomer, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and hon- 
oured by reading lectures on astronomy to King 
George III. We have also as an honour to our 
nation Professor Nichol of Glasgow, a most eminent 
astromoner who wrote largely on the science and 
" who was the first to make known to the public the 
nebular theory " of the formation of worlds. Other 
Scotch astronomers might be mentioned but let 
these suffice. 

The unicorn's horn and the i)i"ickles of the thistle 
are seen cropping up also, mathematically, in more 
sublunary and humbler achievements than in those 
of astronomy. There, for example, is James Wyllie, 
" the Herd Laddie " who is the champion draught^ 
player of the world; and there is Captain George 
Henry MacKenzie, an Aberdeenshire man, who is 
known as " the American Chess Chamjjion." 



CHAPTER XIV. 



FINE AETS. 



If we knew nothing of Scotchmen except what we 
have noticed concerning their scientific discoveries 
their mechanical inventions, and their military and 
athletic exploits, we might well suppose that they 
were a very matter*of=fact set of fellows who cared 
little or nothing about the fine arts, music, poetry, 
painting, sculpture, and architecture. We forget that 
although the thistle has a rough exterior it has 
a warm, soft heart. The truth is the Scotch are 
naturally and even enthusiastically musical and poet- 
ical, and also artistic in other matters: but ever since 
the sixteenth century until about sixty years ago they 
have conscientiously, as a nation, believed, that it 
was unwarrantable and dangerous to employ the fine 
arts (except very simple music) in aid of religion. 
But in secular life the case has been different. 
Where can we find music that so thrills the heart 
of all nations as does that of Scotia? Let the follow- 
ing testimonies from outside sources tell: 

" THE FOLK SONGS OF SCOTLAND." 

"This was the subject of an interesting lecture, illus- 
trated with vocal and instrumemtal music, which was 
delivered in Providence, R. I., last Friday by Mr. 
Louis C Elson, The lecturer is an enthusiastic 

110 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 141 

admirer of Scotch music, in which he says every note 
in the gamut of the emotions is sounded. In this re- 
spect he contends the music of Scotland stands far 
above the music of every other country, and has in- 
spired the composers of all nations. As reasons why 
Scottish music should be the subject of special study 
the speaker mentioned these: (1) Because of its 
great antiquity; (2) because the construction of its 
scales is so peculiar; (3) because it embodies the 
works of the great poets; (4) because of the history 
represented in it; and (5) because its influence on 
modern composers has been so great. Scottish Amer- 
ican, October 28, 1891. 

The following extract from some forgotten source 
shows how the "great composers " appreciate our na- 
tional music: 

SCOTCH MUSIC. 

" In a collection arranged by Beethoven the Welsh 
tune ' Of a Noble Race was Shenkin,' the English 
' Sally in our Alley,' and the Irish ' Last Rose of 
Summer,' are all included among Scotch music. 
This, if it be really the case, may perhaps be ac- 
counted for by the fact that Scotland had a civilized 
court of her own down to a late period; and that thus 
' the products of the north country were naturally 
more largely interchanged with those of other Euro- 
pean countries than could be the products of exclu- 
sive Wales, or of careless, harrassed Ireland.' Boile- 
dieu has incorporated a few Scotch melodies in his 
opera, * La Dame Blanche ' — not unreasonably, see- 
ing that the plot of the opera is mostly based on Sir 
Walter Scott's ' Monastery.' Similarly, 'Auld Lang 



142 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 

Syne ' is worked in among the tunes in Niedermayer's 
' Marie Stuart.' As a third example, Scottish melo- 
dies are worked into Mendelssohn's beautiful Scotch 
symphony." 

" Mendelssohn in the Highlands. — Scottish Society 
says : How many jjeople know that Mendelssohn once 
spent a month in the Highlands collecting bagpipe 
airs, particularly piobaireachd airs, which he made 
use of in some of his best compositions?" Moss 
Jonrmd, August 27, 1897. 

The music of Scotland comes from Scotland's warm 
poetic heart, a heart whose affections have been 
warmed and refined by the Christian religion, and 
thereby trained to appreciate and love " whatsoever is 
pure and lovely and of good report." Even if a 
Scotch poet were an infidel his best sentiments could 
be traced to the same sacred source. And to the same 
source we may trace 

THE SCOTTISH VOICE. 

If the Scottish voice is not the most beautiful in 
the world, says the Pall Mall Gazette, it has no 
rival except the French. But it is perhaps the most 
beautiful. The French are happier, but the Scottish 
loses nothing by that little appeal to the hearer — that 
slight wistfulness. The inflection makes it the ca- 
dence that — like some Georgian melodies — does not 
finish, as it were, on the keynote, but dips a little way 
and then it is suspended. What adds to all this 
charm is the little tone of education which the Scot- 
tish voice possesses in all ranks. 

POETS AND SONGS. 

Scotland abounds in poets. If, as has been said, 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 143 

every seventh man in Paisley is a poet, it would evi- 
dently be an absurd task to take the whole country 
into account, and attempt to do more than merely 
notice some of their most popular songs and other 
productions without mentioning the authors' names 




ROBERT BURNS. 



Here is a mere swatch o' their sangs, " Were'na 
my heart licht I wad die, There's nae luck aboot the 
hoose, Mary weep no more for me. Flowers o' the 
Forest, And ye sal walk in silk attire. McGregor's 
gathering, O'er the Muir among the Heather, My 
ain Fireside, Auld Robin Gray, The Boatie rows. 
Wha'll be King but Charlie, The Laird o' Cockpen, 
Caller Herrin, Teribus and Teri Odin,- Will ye no 
come back again? Cheer Boys, Cheer, Alister Mc- 



144 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Allister, Leezie Lyiidsay, The Four Maries, The 
Braes o' Yarrow, Bird of the Wilderness, Annie Lau- 
rie, The Braes o' Balquidder, Tarn Glen, The Maple 
Leaf Forever, Logan Braes, The Flower o' Dunblane, 
Jennies Bawbee, Auld Guidman ye're a Drucken 
Carle, Keen blaws the Win' o'er the Braes o' GlenifiPer, 
Gloomy Winters noo awa', Let us go. Lassie, go, 
Bonnie Dundee, Oor Guidman cam hame at e'en. 
Scenes of Woe and Scenes of Pleasure, Jenny Dang 
the Weaver, Kelvin Grove, The Lass o' Gowrie, 
Bonny Kilmeny, Down the Burn Davie, Castles in 
the Air, When the Kye comes Hame, Scotland yet, 
Our Bugles Sang Truce, Wandering Willie, John 
Anderson my Jo, Afton Water, The Braes o' Balloch- 
myle, Comin through the Rye, Scots wha hae, O why 
left I my hame? My Love is but a Lassie yet, Auld 
Lang Syne, Maggie Lauder, This is no my ain hoose, 
Lochaber no more, The Blue Bells of Scotland, Fare- 
well to Bonny Tiviotdale, Duncan Gray came here to 
woo, Rule Britannia, Ye Mariners of England, A 
Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea, Ye Banks and Braes 
of Bonny Doon, The Land o' the Leal, My Nannie's 
awa. Of a' the airts the win can Blaw, Farewell to 
Fiunery, Tullochgorum, The Birks of Aberfeldy, The 
wee, wee German Lairdie, A wee Bird Cam to our 
ha' Door, Came ye by Athol, The Standard on the 
Braes o' Mar, Get up and Bar the Door, Mary of 
Arygle, Within a mile o' Edinburgh toun. Whistle 
o'er the lave o't." To this list of Scottish lyrics more 
could easily be added; but let these suffice to show 
what a rich medley of poetry, patriotism, pathos, and 
drollery lurks under the usually staid and grave ex- 
terior of the Scottish character. Many of these 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 145 

songs are sung with high appreciation the wide 
world over wherever there is any knowledge of the 
Scottish language. 

The powerful influence of Scotch song among 
different nationalities might here be illustrated by 
various incidents; but let the following, from the To- 
ronto Mail, August 14, 1873, suffice: 

" A touching incident is related of the Eev. Kichard 
S. Storrs, the father of the Kev. Dr. Storrs, of Brooklyn. 
Recently the sixty = first anniversary of his settlement 
over the Congregational church of Braintree, Massa- 
chusetts, was celebrated. 'As the venerable pastor 
moved with feeble steps up the aisle, he was greeted 
with Auld Lange Syne on the organ. Overcome by 
the touching reception, the old man threw himself on 
the sofa and wept like a child.' Of all that were 
present at his settlement in 1811 no one remained to 
see the present anniversary." 

Then we have many droll poems such as Watfy and 
Meg by Sandy Wilson, the celebrated ornithologist; 
and Tarn o' Shanter by Burns; and his Cotter's Saiur- 
day Nichf, in which he describes truly one o' thae 
scenes of hame religion. 

"From which auld Scotia's grandeur springs; 
Which makes her loved at home, revered abroad." 

And, we hae sic weird, eerie, eldritch poems as 
Will Nicholson's Brownie o' Blednoch, ca'd Aiken 
Drumm; and sic lieart=sair anes as Willie Laidlaw's 
Lucy's Flittin, and Willie Motherwell's Jeanie Morri- 
son. Many an audience has been fairly melted to 
tears when a real Scotch elocutionist has recited to 
them Jeanie Morrison. But then he gave the true 



146 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

pronunciation and intonations of the language. 
What a burning shame it is to our country and to our 
mither tongue, that, when sons or daughters of Scotch 
parents have acquired a smattering of German, 
French, or Italian, they will pique themselves on a 
correct pronunciation of these foreign languages; but 
when they come to sing a Scotch song or give a 
Scotch reading they cannot pronounce the braid 
Scotch because forsooth they think it is vulgar to do 
so! Our noble Queen does not think or do so. She 
delights in the sturdy, couthie language of auld 
Scotland. It is only the snobs, the shabby=genteel, 
the unpatriotic, or at least the uneducated Scotch 
folks who do not follow the Queen's example, but gen- 
erally abandon their mother tongue for some of the 
worst pronunciations of what is usually called Eng- 
lish. 

We lately heard Annie Laurie sung in public, by a 
quartette, three of whom were of Scotch parentage; 
and how did they pronounce the refrain " I will lay 
me down and die," which ought, of course, to be pro- 
nounced Lowrie, I will lay me doon an' dee'^ They 
j)ronounced it as though it were all English — "down" 
rhyming with clown, and " die " rhyming with stye. 
Oh! it was enough to make a Scotchman hiss like a 
serpent at the traitorous murderers of their mother 
tongue, or to lay himsel' doon and dee in utter disgust. 
We have heard a highly educated clergyman, born in 
this country, of south or west of Ireland parentage, 
and who had never been in Scotland, recite Watty 
and Meg as correctly as if he were a native of Pais- 
ley, and had never been out of it. It was an honour 
to him, and a rebuke to any silly, snobbish, recreant 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD U7 

Scotch folks who were present. Scotchmen and 
Scotchwomen! Keep up your mither tongue at 
hame. It is a noble language. Professor Blackie, of 
Edinburgh, that true=hearted Scot, who is no ordinary 
judge of languages, well says of Scotch, that " It is the 
lyric dialect of the English language. It is to Eng- 
lish what the Doric was to Greece, and Homer to 
Greek literature; and the greatest vulgarity he knows 
of is the affectation of gentility." 

The following extract from Scribncr''s Magazine, 
(April 1895) tells how an intelligent outsider can ap- 
preciate our mother tongue: 

" The Charm in Scotch Words. — I wonder if persons 
who can write Scotch are sufficiently aware of the 
great literary advantage they have over writers who 
are not born to that ability. It is no credit to them 
that they can do it, It is a gift of nature dropped in 
their lap. I never heard of any one who learned by 
artificial means to write Scotch. Scotch writers do it, 
and no one else. It has long been obvious that the 
proi3ortion of good writers to the whole Scotch popu- 
lation was exceedingly large, but I do not remember 
that it has ever been pointed out how much easier for 
a Scotchman to be a good writer than another be- 
cause of his innate command of the Scotch tongue. 
There are such delightful words in that language; 
words that sing on the printed page wherever their 
employer happens to drop them in; words that rustle; 
words that skirl, and words that clash and thump." 

Scotland has given to the world a good share of 
other poetry besides songs. For example: Tlie 
Seasons, by Thompson; The Pleasures of Hope, 
by Campbell; The Gentle Shepherd, by Ramsey; The 



148 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Course of Time, by Pollock; The Sahbath, by Gra- 
ham; Marmion, by Scott; and The Grave, by Blair, 
But as for popular hymns; Scotland, as compared 
with England has not produced many. 

HYMN WEITERS. 

Horatius Bonar wrote, Hymns of Faith and Hope, 
including the following: A Few More Years shall 
Roll; I heard the Voice of Jesus say; I was a Wander- 
ing Sheep; I lay my Sins on Jesus; Thy way not 
Mine, O Lord. 

James Montgomery wrote. Hail to the Lord's An- 
nointed. Forever with the Lord. Go to darli Geth- 
semane; Lord teach us how to pray aright; and 
several others in common use. 

William Knox, born 1789, and died at Edinburgh 
1825, wrote two collections of sacred lyrics, named 
respectively "Songs of Israel," and " Harp of Zion." 
Two of his best productions are: "Acquaint Thee, 
O mortal! Acquaint Thee with God," and "Oh why 
should the Spirit of Mortal be proud?" The latter 
we are told, was a special favourite of Abraham Lin- 
coln, president of the United States. 

Mary Lundy Duncan, wrote, Jesus tender Shep- 
herd. 

" Where high the heavenly Temple stands," was 
written by Michael Bruce; and that favourite hymn, 
among children. There is a Happy Land, was written 
by Andrew Young an Edinburgh man. 

But besides the hymns in English, Scotland has pro- 
duced not a few, both ancient and modern, in the 
Gaelic language. The modern authors being such as 
Dougall Buchanan; Dr. MacGregor, Nova Scotia; 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILI21N0 THE WORLD 149 

Dr, MacDonald, Ferintosh; Rev. Peter Grant of 
Strathsj)ey; D. MacDougall of Barra, and John Mor- 
rison of Harris. 

PKOSE WEITEES. 

The prose literature of Scotland has had much to do 
in enlightening and civilizing the world. We have 
already noticed some of its writers on science, but we 
must now, omitting a host of novelists and historians 
confine our attention simply to some of those works 
intended for the enlightenment of the general pub- 
lic. Dick, " the Christian Philosopher," wrote in 
popular style on Astronomy, The Future State, and 
The Improvement of Society. Dr. Chalmers wrote 
eloquently on the same subjects — sermons on astron- 
omy, and the moral improvement of the masses in 
our cities. Rev. Dr. Henry Duncan wrote the Philos- 
ophy of the Seasons, and Dr. Adam Smith, in his 
Wealth of Nations, gave the first sensible ideas on 
political economy. Chambers's Journal, and Infor- 
mation for the People, and Black's Encyclopedia Bri- 
tanica have led the general reading public into new 
and numerous fields of knowledge unknown to them 
before. Walter Besant says of Chambers's Journal, 
" It has now a circulation of 250,000; and if each 
copy represents a household, one=sixth of the in- 
habitants of England and Scotland read it. 

Then Hugh Blair's lectures on rhetoric and belles= 
lettres, the Edinburgh Revieiv, Blackwood's Maga- 
zine, and the intensely interesting Nodes Amhro- 
siance of Christopher North, if they did not originate, 
they at least greatly contributed to a higher style of 
literary criticism than had before existed in Britain; 



150 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

and then what helps to Bible and theological students 
have been Cruden's Concordance, Brown's Diction- 
ary of the Bible, Edie's Ecclesiastical Cyclopedia, 
and the Tables of ancient coins, weights and meas- 
ures, by the learned, witty, and humane Dr. Arbuth- 
not, physician in ordinary to Queen Anne! These 
authors are considered as having done pioneer work 
in modern Biblical literature. 

Scotland has given to the world not only a fair 
share of religious books in the form of sermons, but 
also some valuable works on what is called natural 
theology, or the testimony of nature to the truth of 
Christianity. In this department we have such emi- 




DUKE OF AEGYLE. 



nent writers as the Duke of Argyle, the Eev. Dr. Mc- 
Cosh, Sir William Dawson, Hugh Miller, the honour- 
able William Gladstone, Rev. Dr. Wardlaw, Professor 
Drummond, and others of less note. 

The novel, like the newspapers, is now a powerful 
educator in good and evil. Some works of fiction are 
strongly tainted with skepticism, religious error and 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 151 

licentiousness. Scottish novels are happily free from 
such pollutions. From the magnificent x^roductions 
of Sir Walter Scott down to the humbler efforts of 
the Scottish novelists of the present day, their tend- 
ency is to moral purity and goodness, and even their 




SIR WALTER SCOTT. 



failings lean to virtue's side. It is therefore pleasing 
to reflect that such healthful literature is at present 
so popular. 

But how shall we classify that much Germanized, 
voluminous, and powerful writer, Thomas Carlyle, 
the sage of Craigenputtock, or as the English gener- 
ally call him "sage of Chelsea "? As a brilliant his- 
torian and biographer he is unsurpassed. Warm 
hearted and sympathetic, with a keen sense of the 



152 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

ludicrous, yet the fierce pamphleteer denouncing in 
furious language popular shams and humbugs. His 
writings lack the Christian element, else he had been 
a greater power for good in this dark world. Cham- 




THOMAS CARLYLE. 



ber's Encyclopedia says of him, "What position Car- 
lyle will ultimately occupy in the literature of his 
country it is not easy to determine, . . . future 
ages may j)ossibly wonder at their fiery splendors, 



SCOTLAND'S SHAtiE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 153 

and fail to sympathize with their prophetic enthusi- 
asms." 




EGBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. 



Such writers as K. L. Stevenson, Barrie, Crockett 
McDonald, Black, " Ian McLaren," Miss Muloch and 
Mrs. Oliphant, are benefactors to the novehreading 
public. 

But Sir Walter Scott, above other literary men, 
deserves here more than a passing notice, not only on 
account of the great number and variety of his works, 
so rich in history and descriptive of natural scenery 
and human character; but also on account of the dis- 
tracting circumstances in which his voluminous wri- 
tings were produced. Literary men generally require 
quietness, leisure, and time for research, and for pol- 
ishing their periods for the press; but no such 



154 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

favorable circumstances were afforded Sir Walter, 
even during his years of financial prosperity, and 
while yet no cloud of financial disaster was seen on 
the horizon to overshadow his life, and urge his pen 
to greater prduction for retrieving his losses. In the 
full tide of his prosperity, and in the midst of innu- 
merable ofiicial, social, and domestic distractions, 
as no other literary man, perhaps, experienced, his 
pen continued to be " the jjen of a ready writer," and 
he the greatest wonder among ready writers of the 
period. This is well illustrated by the following 
extract from the Glasgow Herald: 

"There is no house in all Great Britain, save the 
birthplaces of Burns and Shakespeare, which rivals 
Abbotsford as a goal of literary i^ilgrimage, and there 
is none with which so much of literary history is 
associated. True, it was but for a little while that its 
glory lasted, since no more than a score of years 
elapsed between Scott's removal to it from Ashiestipl 
and his death under its roof. Yet in that short time 
the brand new mansion was the scene of more intel- 
lectual activity and more social brilliance and enjoy- 
ment than has been witnessed by all the feudal for- 
tresses of Scotland put together. From 1812 to 
1826, at any rate, the literary life of Scotland may be 
said to have centered in Abbotsford, and it was 
thither, as to the Intellectual headquarters of the 
country that every stranger of note, and many of no 
note at all but of great curiosity, came to pay court. 
Everybody knows how in those days of prosperity 
Sir Walter literally kept open house in his castle on 
the Border, receiving and tolerating visitors and 
invaders of all kinds, sometimes to the extent of 
'sixteen parties in a day.' What a varied proces- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 155 

sion of figures, obscure and distinguished, welcome 
and obtrusive, must have passed through the door- 
way of Abbotsford during those busy and crowded 
years! Wordsworth and Miss Edgeworth, Tom 
Moore and Henry Hallam, Washington Irving and 
Sir Humphrey Davy, Wilkie and Turner, the exiled 
French nobles and the wandering Prince of Sweden 
— figures like these alternate with the typical inquisi- 
tive Yankee tourist, and also, be it added, with the 
commonplace lairds and plain farmers of Teviot- 
dale and the Forest. In the golden montlis of 
autumn, and, indeed, whenever the Court of Session 
will let 'the Shirra' be off to his sheriffdom, 
there is a constant succession of breakfast parties 
and dinner parties, walking and riding and shooting 
excursions — what Carlyle in one of his atrabiliar 
moods not quite unpardonably called an 'inane 
racket ' — culminating in that glorious day and yet 
more glorious night of the Abbotsford Hunt, which, 
as the Selkirkshire farmer declared, was " the ae 
thing in the warld worth living for." And all the 
while the kindly host, whose days seemed fully taken 
up with entertaining and hunting and planting and 
gardening, has his brains full of the adventures of Dan- 
die Dinmont and Jeannie Deans, and Roland Graeme 
and Rebecca the Jewess, and every morning in the 
early quiet of the study, sheet after sheet is filled 
with words which will fill the whole world for gener- 
ations to come with laughter and tears." 

THE FIEST PUBLISHER. 

In the literary world, a publisher, that is, a pub- 
lisher on a large scale and on his own account, is 



156 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

really a title of a modern functionary; and Scotland 
seems to have some claim to the first of that now 
numerous class who do so much to enlighten the 
world: for thus speaks the Scottish American of 
January 5, 1898. 

" The First Scottish Publisher.— Scotland— which 
has given to the publishing world its Constable, its 
Murray, its Blackwood, its MacMillan, et miiltos 
alios — seems to us to afford the best example of a 
modern publisher in the person of an unduly for- 
gotten pioneer. The story of the Edinhiirgli Review 
has been so often told, and Lord Cockburn's elo- 
quent testimony to Archibald Constable's princely 
methods and their effects is so well known, that it is 
only natural that earlier efforts should be forgotten. 
But there seems every reason to believe that an Edin- 
burgh bookseller, Charles Elliot, was the founder of 
modern publishing, and that only premature death 
arrested an illustrious career. Constable's testimony 
is alone sufficient. At a time when it was still com- 
mon to find thirty booksellers' names on a title=page, 
and when Johnson declared of remuneration at the 
rate of six guineas a sheet that ' it might be obtained 
for a particular sheet, but not communihns sheetibus, 
Charles Elliot had already begun the grand style 
of publishing, and had the courage to oppose the oli- 
garchy of the London trade by planting a branch in 
its midst." 

PAINTERS. 

Scotland has produced so many painters, that we 
can scarcely afford space for their names. None of 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 157 

them have attained perhaps to such excellency as a 
few of the continental artists, but take the artists 
generally of the old world, and Scotland, in com- 
parison, is not behind them. Here is a list of which 
Scotchmen may not be ashamed: George Jameson, 
the Vandyke of Scotland; Sir Francis Grant, R. A., 
called the "good society" artist; Sir Henry Raeburn; 
Sir John Watson Gordon; William Aikman, David 
Allan, the Scottish Hogarth; Sir William Allan, the 
historical painter; the learned Allan Ramsay, chief 
painter to George III.; Alexander Nasmyth, who 
gave us the true portrait of Robert Burns; Sir David 
Wilkie; Thomas Faed; Horatio McCulloch; my 
cousin James Howe, " the panoramic and animal 
painter;" Sir Daniel McNee; David Roberts, the 
architectural painter; Noel Paton; Thomson of Dud- 
dington; Crawford; Brodie; Bonnar; Sir William F. 
Douglas; William Leighton Leitch, who taught 
water coloring to the Queen and all the royal family: 
and in photography we may well mention the late 
William Notman, a native of Paisley, whose fame as 
a photograi^hic artist is unexcelled, and who has had 
studios simultaneously in Montreal, Halifax, Boston, 
Albany, and New York. 

The fine arts may be employed for moral or immor- 
al purposes: but Scotch art, whether pictorial or sculp- 
tural has invariably " leaned to virtue's side"; so that 
its tendency has been to elevate and refine the public 
taste. Those horrid caricatures of the kings of Scot- 
land in the Picture Gallery of Holy Rood Palace are 
not Scotch but th e daubs of one De Witt, a Dutch 
man. 



158 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 
SCULPTORS. 

Of sculptors we have not so long a list as that of 
the painters, but it includes some who compare fa. 
vourably with those of any other civilized country, 
such as Steel, Thorn. Mossman, Rhind, Lawson, 
Drummond, McBeth, Dous::las, Mrs. D. O. Hill, sis- 
ter of Sir Noel Paton, Alex. M. Calder, of Philadel^ 
phia U. S., John Munro, of Baltimore, U. S., distin- 
guished for works of solid merit in Britain and 
America — of these and a score of others Scotland has 
reason to be proud. 

ARCHITECTS. 

Of Scotch architects we need only mention two or 
three out of many. Robert Adam, a native of Kir- 
kaldy, was made architect to George III. Says Bee- 
ton, " Adam gave a new turn to the architecture of his 
country, and procured great fame by the number and 
elegance of his designs. He and his brother were 
the first to make use of stucco in imitation of stone. 
He was buried in Westminster Abbey." James Fer- 
guson, a native of Ayr, wrote largely on architecture 
in such works as. Ancient Architecture of Hindustan; 
Ancient Topography of Jerusalem; True Principles 
of Beauty in Architecture; The Palaces of Nineveh 
and Persepolis Restored:" and which last he illus- 
trated by the " Assyrian Court," which he planned 
and erected in the crystal palace. He was apjjoint- 
ed superintendent of the great Sydenham palace, Lon- 
don. Among the living architects of Scotland we 
cannot but mention our gonial friend William Hay 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 159 

who has lately restored St. Giles's Cathedral, Edin- 
burgh, and made it " look as weel as new." 

BOTANY. 

Akin to the fine arts is the delightful science of 
Botany. Scotland has done much for botany; and 
indeed has been the means of making it worthy of 
being called a science. Thus the learned English 
journal called the Atheneum of 1858, in an extended 
obituary notice of Robert Brown, D. 0. L.; F, R. S. 
says, "He was the foremost scientific man of the cen- 
tury. Till his time botany can scarcely be said to 
have had a scientific foundation." Humboldt called 
him Botanicorum facile princeps. He was born at 
Montrose, Dec. 21, 1773; died at London, June 10, 
1858. Then we have had other illustrious botanists, 
who both taught and wrote extensively on the science, 
such as Professor Balfour of Edinburgh, Rev. Colin 
Milne who wrote a Botanical Dictionary. 

ZOOLOGY. 

In advancing and illustrating the nearly related 
subject of zoology, or history of birds and beasts, 
Scotland has given her fair share. Alexander Wil- 
son of Paisley had nearly finished the eighth volume 
of his splendidly illustrated work — The Ornithology 
of America, when he died. Then another Paisley 
man James Wilson, F. R. S. E. younger brother to 
the celebrated Professor John Wilson, of Edinburgh 
(Christopher North) must be considered one of the 
greatest naturalists of modern times, for he has cov- 
ered 900 pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica in 
illustration of his favourite subject. It is pleasing to 



160 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

know that he was a most devout Christian, as his Bi- 
ography shows, written by the fluent and graceful 
pen of the late Rev. Dr. Hamilton of London, him- 
self a native of the " guid auld toun." Then last, 
but not least, we have had Professor William Macgil- 
livray, of Marschal College, Aberdeen, whose princi- 
pal and larger works were History of British Birds, 
History of British Quadrupeds, and Natural History 
of Dee-side. 



CHAPTER XV. 



TEXTILE MANUFACTURES. 



As already noticed the mither Thistle," before 
sendin' her bairns out into the world has them a' de- 
cently clad. Wha has'na heard o' Paisley threid, 
Paisley shawls, Kilmarnocli bonnets, Scotch tweeds, 
carpets, cottons, and tartans? Scotland has had nae 
sma' share in supply in the wide worl, wi' dacent com- 
fortable claes, besides cleiding her ain bairns. Our 
scientific frien' McFarlane sent me the following 
facts, that, speak for theirsels: "Thomas Morton of 
Kilmarnocli, invented the barrel carpet loom, and 
three-ply carjaets, — great inventions. 

" Richard Whytock of Edinburgh, invented the 
method of weaving Brussels carpets on a plain loom, 
— one of the most scientific and beautiful inventions 
on record, 

" In a lecture delivered before the society of Arts 
in London, April 30th, 1856 by Joseph Burch, he 
says, * Glasgow Calico printers are ahead of all com- 
petitors. If there be any new machine or process en- 
quire first in Glasgow: you will not find it in Man- 
chester. Glasgow seeks and encourages every novel- 
ty. The delaine trade, the handkerchief trade, the 
shawl trade, and the muslin trade, are now principally 
in Glasgow hands, and they do them well.' " 

161 



162 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WOULD 

" Scotland introduced the muslin trade into Ireland, 
and taught the peasantry the method of embroid- 
ery of fine linen cambric: it has been a great blessing 
to that country." 

A NEW ARTIFICIAL SILK. 

Scottish American, 1898. 

A PROSPECTIVE GLASGOW INDUSTRY. 

" Processes for the production of artificial silk have 
engaged the attention of inventors for many years. 
Search amongst the numerous vegetable fibers, more 
especially those of tropical climates, has been made 
by one set of inventors in the hope of finding fila- 
ments of a sufficiently tine substance, with the glossy 
surface necessary to present the characteristic appear- 
ance of the silk obtained from the cocoon of the silk- 
worm; and another set have been working with solu- 
tions of gun=cotton so as to obtain fine filaments hav- 
ing a lustrous surface. 

"But a new j^rocess invented by Mr. Adam Millar, 
manufacturer, Montrose street, Glasgow, produces an 
artificial silk from gelatine by a process of remark- 
able simplicity, so that the fine yarn can be sold at a 
very low price, and still give a handsome profit to the 
maker. Now, gelatine is the very material from 
which the silkworm produces its filament of silk. 
The silkworm produces gelatine, which it ejects as a 
fine stream from a small gland in its head. As it 
leaves the gland the gelatine is quite liquid, but it be- 
comes an insoluble filament when it is formed into the 
cocoon. How it becomes insoluble is some what diffi- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 163 

cult to say for there is no chemical treatment to 
which it is subjected." 

TRAVELLERS AND EXPLORERS. 

It has already been observed that the young thistles 
are great travellers. When the time has come for 
them to leave their native place, they issue forth in 
search of adventures; they rise, and whirl, and soar, 

"In a' the airts the win' can blaw, 
And o'er the hills an' far awa." 

So, we see James Bruce, of Kinnaird passing 
through Arabia Felix and on to Abyssinia in search 
of the source of the Nile; and Mungo Park, of Sel- 
kirkshire, away in Africa to solve the problem of the 
existence and course of the river Niger; and Thomas 
Pringle, the poet and philanthropist, travelling and 
working to put a stop to the slave trade in Africa, 

"Where in the desert he loved to ride 
With the silent Bushboy by his side," 

There are Livingstone and Moffat doing pioneer 
missionary work in the same dark continent; and fol- 
lowed by such courageous explorers as Keith, John- 
ston, and Joseph Thomson, the latter of whom received 
the gold medal of the Koyal Geographical Society, 
also the gold medal of Edinburgh University for 
geology and zoology. And there is Sir John Ross, a 
Wigtonshire man exploring the Arctic regions, and 
astraddle of, not the geograpliical but the magnetic 
North Pole; and John Rae L. R. CS., M. D., LL.D., 
F. R. S., F. R. G. S., an Orkney man who covered 
28,000 miles chiefly on foot, and enjoyed excellent 
health in the same cold regions during two winters, 



164 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

while living like the Esquimaux in snow huts and 
without fire; Sir John Richardson, fellow explorer 
with Sir John Franklin; Simon Fraser of Oulbogie 
who discovered the river far north which bears his 
name; and Sir Alexander Mackenzie is honoured by 
his name being given to the river which he discov- 
ered and explored in the same far away country. 
What a long, difficult journey must it have been 
for Lord Selkirk's Highlanders to leave Scotland and 
make their way to the Red River without steamboat 
or railway! They were pioneers of thousands and 
probably millions now moving to the North West. 
Need we mention John McLean, an Argyleshire man, 
the first white man who saw and described the Great 
Falls of Ashwanipi, in Labrador? Or the grandson 
of the Earl of Moray, Arthur St. Clair, who gave his 
name to one of our smaller lakes, and who founded 
the city of Cincinnati? 

Last year our public papers had this brief item of 
news, "London, Oct, 28. — Robert Brown is dead," 
Now there may be many Robert Browns, of dijfferent 
nationalities; but who is this M^hose name and fame 
should seemingly be known to everybody? Let the 
following obituary notice tell: — 

"Robert Brown (' Campsterianus') was born at 
Campster Caithness, March 23, 1842. He was edu- 
cated at the University of Edinburgh and in the 
European universities. Between 1863 and 1866 he 
travelled for scientific purposes in many of the least 
known parts of America and some of the Pacific 
Islands, from the West Indies and Venezuela to 
Alaska and Bering sea coast, as botanist in the Brit- 
ish Columbia expedition and commander of the Van- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 165 

couver island exploring expedition, during which he 
charted all the interior of Vancouver, then unknown. 
In 1867 he visited Greenland and formed those theo- 
retical conclusions regarding the nature of the inland 
ice, afterwards confirmed by Nansen and Peary. 

" Since then Dr. Brown has travelled extensively, 
and has been engaged in educational work. He was 
an honorary or ordinary member of many learned 
societies in England and. America and on the Conti- 
nent, of many of which he was an officer. His name 
has been attached to various new species of plants 
discovered by him and to geographical points in Van- 
couver island and elsewhere. 

" He wrote wholly or conjointly about thirty vol- 
umes and a large number of scientific memoirs and 
nearly 4,000 articles in reviews in various languages. 
His separate works are chiefly geographical, ethno- 
graphical, and natural history." 

Many more illustrations of the thistle's propensity 
to travel might be given, but let these suffice. 

The thistle "ettles weel" in its travels. In plain 
speaking, when true Scots leave home for distant 
lands, they have generally some definite, sensible, 
worthy object in view; and they generally succeed. 
But to succeed requires certain mental, moi'al and 
bodily qualities; such as intelligence, honesty, tem- 
perance, courtesy, humour, enterprise, courage and 
perseverance. Now all these elements of character 
for success in social life are notoriously those of the 
genuine Scot the world over; and they are traceable 
to his training in the Christian religion, which 
expands his mind, warms his heart with kindly affec- 
tions, and leads his conscience habitually to " lean to 



166 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

virtue's side." It must be acknowledged, however, 
that there are many exceptions to this general char- 
acter. How may these be accounted for? First, 
there are many natives of Scotland now=a=days who 
cannot be called Scotch, because they are the off- 
spring of some foreign immigrants, and who although 
influenced in some degree, for good, by Scotland's 
religion, are yet opi3osed to it. They may speak the 
braid Scotch, but they have not the Scotch mind, 
heart, or conscience. Next, as in all Christian com, 
munities so among the purely Scotch, we may 
expect to find some "black sheep." And, further, we 
must notice a distinction between Highlanders and 
Lowlanders, for example, in the matter of courtesy, 
Professor Blackie says, " The Highlander is always a 
gentleman: the Lowlander only sometimes." To 
which we may add, that there is between Highlander 
and Lowlander such an intermixture now that 
Lowland gruffness has become greatly modified for 
the better and tends to success in life. 

TEMPEEANCE AND .GENEROSITY. 

But the general Scotch character is not uncom- 
monly charged with certain objectionable qualities 
that really do not belong to it, such as avarice, drunk- 
enness, and radicalism. If radicalism means opposi- 
tion to tyranny in church or state, and fighting for 
liberty to do and enjoy what conscience believes to 
be right, then Scotland may, with great justice, be 
charged with radicalism. Scotland is not the 
drunken nation that some jjeople suppose. If tem- 
perance means total abstinence from all alcoholic 
drinks, then Scotland, in proportion to her popula- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 167 

tion, has as large a number of total abstainers as any- 
other Christian nation. 

For the information of all who are interested in the 
drink question, Dr. Cawson Burns, of the United 
Kingdom Alliance, has analyzed the liquor bill of 
Great Britain and Ireland for 1891. Here are some 
of his figures: 

" Comparing the consumption per head for England 
Scotland and Ireland, it appears that every man, 
woman and child in England expended on drink £4 
Is. 6d. in the year, while in Scotland the per capita 
consumption was equal only to X8 5s., and in Ireland 
it came down to £2 2s. 4d. The gross figures are full 
of meaning for the temperance party, while the com- 
parative tables acquit the people of Ireland from a 
long standing superstition which has prevailed in 
reference to their capacity for strong drink." — 
Empire, Toronto. 

"Out of fourteen magistrates in Glasgow ten are 
teetotallers. These figures at once indicate the 
strength of the temperance vote in the Council 
Chamber there." 1896. 

The charge of avarice, if not something worse, 
against Scotchmen is sometimes made by saying that 
"Scotch folks keep the Sabbath and everything else 
they can get." The great French lecturer. Max 
O'Rell, thought fit lately, to make the same charge in 
another form. In his lecture in Toronto on the 
characteristics of Englishmen and Scotchmen as 
compared with Frenchmen, he said some good things 
of the Scotchman, such as that he was "frugal, 
industrious, persevering and humourous. He was 
strong as the granite of his native hills. He was not 



168 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

easily won over, but when once he is your friend he 
is your friend forever. The Scotch were the great 
sinew of the British Empire." But after all this 
laudation O'Rell goes on to say, that the Scotchman 
" can read, write, and reckon — especially reckon, 
Jews never got a footing in Scotland. One went to 
Aberdeen once, but left next day with his traps. 
When asked if he left because no other Jews were 
there he replied, ' No, they were all Jews.' " 

Now, we hapiDen to be much better acquainted 
with Scotland and the Scotch than Monsieur O'Rell 
can possibly be, and we repudiate and repel as utterly 
unwarranted and without foundation in truth this 
charge of avarice, penuriousness, niggardliness, or by 
whatever other name this alleged national selfishness 
is called. As to Jews in Scotland, we have no sta- 
tistics at hand to Inform us as to their numbers there; 
but this we know for a fact, that about the year 1883 
there must have been some Jews thriving in the city 
of Glasgow, for they were the first to purchase a 
burial place in the aristocratic Necropolis, at that 
time, and adorn it at great expense; and we have not 
heard of them since leaving the city "with their 
traps." As to Aberdonians, we have been acquainted 
with some individuals and families of them in difPer- 
ent parts of this wide country, and have found them 
no loss generous than their neighbours of other 
nationalities; and we know somewhat intimately a 
considerable congregation which consists almost 
exclusively of them, whose minister, after serving 
them for about a dozen years, told us that they were 
a people so kind and generous to him, that " he 
believed they could not feel comfortable in their beds 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD lfi9 

if they supposed their minister were not comforta- 
ble." If such be the case with the much misrepre- 
sented Aberdonians, O'Rell, and such as he, may 
learn to thiidi more correctly and justly of the Scotch 
in and from other parts of - Scotland, where the 
natives are supposed to be more open handed. There 
are of course some close-fisted Scotch folk — some 
born and brought up on moorlands where the bawbees 
are unco scarce and maun therefore be weel hained 
and wisely spent so as to be just and honest before 
being generous — these sentiments and habits are apt 
to cling to such people as part of their religion, even 
when the bawbees are no longer scarce; others who 
have never been poor, are stingy; but such mean 
creatures are found everywhere. They are, however, 
the excejition in Scotland, as every one acquainted 
with the country can testify. Highland hospitality is 
proverbial; and with equal justice might we speak of 
hospitality in the Lowlands. But let us consider 
Scotland's liberality on a great scale. When a fam- 
ine occurs, or destitution among masses of working- 
men, from want of employment — events which have 
occurred more than once to nations outside of Scot- 
land — then whence come, according to ability, the 
largest contributions for relief of the distress? 
When what is called the Disruption of the Estab- 
lished Kirk of Scotland in 1843 occurred, and some 
hundreds of ministers, for the sake of j)rincii3le, left 
their comfortable manses, glebes, and legally assured 
stipends, trusting for future support to the voluntary 
contributions from such of the people as might fol- 
low them — what a magnificent example ensued in 
building manses and churches, and in raising funds 



170 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

for the support of tlie ministers and missionaries! 
It was indeed " a liberality above all praise, and 
which has not yet ceased!" Have the clergy and 
people of O'Reirs France, or indeed of any other 
nation ever shown a greater devotion to principle, or 
a greater voluntary liberality? The other religious 
bodies in Scotland show a similar generous spirit in 
supporting religious and benevolent institutions. 
When the Scots leave home and settle abroad they 
are the givers rather than the receivers of charity. 
Of the scores of tramps who have come to our door 
not half=asdozen have been Scotch, and only one of 
these few did we discover to be a scheming, ne'er-do- 
weel. 

Who are the men in our day most noted for lib- 
eral gifts for promoting the world's welfare? Syl- 
vester Lind, who arrived in Chicago from Scotland 
with just two sovereigns in his pocket, gave to the 
trustees of the Presbyterian University to be estab- 
lished at Lake Forest, above twenty- five miles north 
of the city, the sum of one hundred thousand dollars. 
John Ross Robertson, proprietor of the Toronto 
Telegram, has erected a large, commodious summer 
residence, on the island opposite Toronto, to afford 
the poor children of the city the benefit of fresh air 
from the lake. William Dunn, M, P. devoted four 
thousand pounds last year, to purchase an open 
space in Paisley, Scotland, for the benefit of working- 
men. The following is from the Scottish American 
Journal of October 25th, 1891 : 

MCGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL. 

" Mr. Peter Redpath, the chief partner in the larg- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 171 

est sugar refinery business in Canada, now resident 
in England, has announced his intention of present- 
ing the McGill University, Montreal, with a library 
building at a cost of about X40,000. The University, 
which is dependent upon voluntary aid, has already 
benefited by Mr, Redpath's generosity, its fine 
museum valued at X20,000 having been given to it by 
that gentleman ten years ago. The original founda- 
tion of the University was £120,000 bequeathed by 
the Hon. James McGill in 1818, and it has since been 
the recipient of several handsome gifts, among them 
Sir Donald A. Smith's endowment of the faculty for 
women with £24,000, and Mr. W. C. McDonald's 
donation of £100,000 for the erection of the physic 
and technical buildings and the endowment of the 
law faculty." 

Says the Toronto Empire of October 10, 1891 : 

ANOTHEK ACT OF MUNIFICENCE. 

" With the Victoria hospital, the result of Sir Don- 
ald Smith's and Lord Mountstephen's princely gift 
of $500,000, nearly completed, and $200,000 for McGill 
from Mr. Peter Redpath, there comes another fine 
donation to one of our most useful institutions. It is 
learned that the will of the late George C Hamilton, 
who died a few weeks ago in Colorado, shows that 
$100,000 has been left to the Montreal General Hos- 
pital, on Dorchester street. The deceased was a son 
of the late Hon. John Hamilton, so well and favour- 
ably known in the Dominion." 

Again, we read in another paper that "Lord Mount- 
stephen (son of a workingman) has given a thousand 
pounds towards the extension of the Mareschal Col- 



172 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

lege, Aberdeen." I see he has just given $1,000 for 
the famine in India. It is so like him. And here is 
more about W. 0. McDonald of Montreal: 

" He has given $85,000," says the Scottish' American 
of March 23rd, 1892, " to McGill University, to be 
api^lied as endowment for the maintenance of the 
Experimental and Engineering buildings which were 
founded by him." 




ANDREW CARNEGIE. 

And what shall we say of that more than princely 
giver, Mr. Andrew Carnegie, who has lavished his 
wealth on his native country more than we wot of? 
The New York Sun says of him: 

"He is reported to be the richest Scotchman in the 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 173 

world, with a larger income than any of his aristocratic 
countrymen, who while enjoying the domains and 
palaces that come to them by inheritance, are apt to 
be hard up for cash at times. Mr. Carnegie talks freely 
of the days of his poverty in Scotland and in this 
country, and tells now happy he was when able to 
earn as high wages as $3 a week in Pittsburgh. He 
recounts his struggle from that time till he became 
wealthy. He is not afraid to scarify those of his fel- 
low millionaires who are mean with their money, and, 
a short time ago, went so far as to say in print, that 
* the man who dies rich dies disgraced.' If he him- 
self dies poor he will have to get rid of a good many 
of his millions before losing his renown as the richest 
Scotchman in the world." 

The following items in the Scottish American for 
1892 are specimens of Andrew's gifts: 

" Mr. Andrew Carnegie's generous gift for a great 
library in Pittsburgh, Pa.,which aggregates $2,100,000, 
provides that $50,000 shall be annually devoted to the 
purchase of American works of art." 

"Mr. Andrew Carnegie has given $30,000 for the 
establishment of a public library in Fairfield, Iowa." 

THE NEW MUSIC HALL— A SUBSTANTIAL GIFT TO 
NEW YORK. 

" What is called the Music Hall, inaugurated in this 
city by a series of concerts last week, is not a single 
hall but a number of halls under one roof. They 
comprise the principal auditorium or Music Hall, 
Kecital Hall, Chamber Music Hall, Large and Small 
Banquet Halls and Meeting Rooms and Parlours, suit- 



174 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

able for lectures, readings and receptions, as well as 
chapter and lodge rooms for secret organizations. The 
building is said to be, substantially, a gift to the music 
lovers of New York from our countryman, Mr. Andrew 
Carnegie. It is situated at the corner of 57th street 
and Seventh avenue, a situation which is easy of 
access from various parts of the city." 



CHAPTER XVI. 



REVERED ABROAD. 



It is as true now as when Burns wrote it, that 
" Scotia is revered abroad." She is revered /or wAa^ 
she is not, as well as for what she is. For ivhat she 
is not let the following simple illustration, by Dr. 
Waugh, of London, England, explain and suffice. 
The Board of Grovernors of the Millbank Peniten- 
tiary had met and determined to try Scotch broth for 
the prisoners; and for this purpose they despatched 
an official to the female prisoners to find a Scotch 
woman to prepare a specimen, as they, being 
Englishmen, were not acquainted with the article. 
They then went on with their business, meanwhile 
supposing that the Scotch woman was in the kitchen 
preparing the specimen. After long waiting the 
messenger appeared and reported, saying, "I have 
searched all the penitentiary and a Scotch woman 
cannot be found in it." 

But it would be far from the truth to insinuate 
that Scotch folks are not found as inmates of 
our penitentiaries. Yet their number as compared 
with the number of inmates of other nationalities on 
this side or the other side of the Atlantic, is a testi- 
mony in favour of the comparative morality of Scot- 
land, so far at least as indictable crimes are concerned. 
The following, from a recent number of the Toronto 

X75 



176 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

Mail and Empire, speaks for the Scot in Canada 
during the past year: 

" The birthplaces of persons convicted for indict- 
able offences in the Dominion during 1897, are as 
follows: England and Wales, 382; Ireland, 233; 
Scotland, 91^ Canada, 3,949; United States, 246; 
other foreign countries, 223; other British posses- 
sions, 10; not given, 587. The proportion of con- 
victions by birthplaces to the total number for the 
years 1884 to 1897 is as follows: England and Wales, 
8.44; Ireland, 6.21; Scotland, 1.99; Canada, 68.33; 
United States, 5,32; other foreign countries and 
British possessions, 3,51; not given, 6.20, For the 
year 1897 the proportion is: England and Wales, 
6,68; Ireland. 4.07; Scotland, 1.59; Canada, 69.03; 
United States, 4.30; other foreign countries and Brit- 
ish possessions, 4.07; not given, 10.26. 

SCOTTISH BANKING. 

Which system of banking is considered by business 
men to be the safest for the depositers and bilb 
holders, and at the same time convenient for bor- 
rowers? Let the following testimony answer. An 
article appeared in the Hamilton Spectator, of the 20tli 
of October, copied from the Chicago Inter Ocea)i, and 
dated Halifax, October 9, 1896; in which reference is 
made to the then existing unrest in the United States 
occasioned by their possible adoption of the free 
coinage of silver. The writer of the article, in an 
interview with Sir William Van Home, the President 
of the Canadian Pacific Railway, asked him, " Does 
the unsettled condition of things affect the Canadian 
markets?" Sir William replied: " It certainly does 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 177 

aflPect them; but the utilization of the Scottish bank- 
ing system here greatly reassures Canadian finances." 
This testimony to the merits of the system, coming 
from such a man means much. For Sir William is 
one of the most intelligent, practical, energetic, and 
successful of the business men in Canada, as is 
p roven by his accumulation of wealth, and his 
admirable management of the magnificent railway of 
which he is President. 

Scotland should be revered in England for what she 
has done there. Scotch missionaries evangelized 
nearly the whole of England after the pagan Saxon 
conquest of the country; and Scotland gave it mac- 
adamized roads, locomotive and stationary steam= 
engines, steamboats, bicycles, electric telegraphs, 
electric lights, telej)hones, and almost all the great 
modern improvements in agriculture and agricultural 
imj)lements. And who founded the Bank of England 
— the greatest bank in the world? It was Willie 
Paterson, a Scot; and it has been admitted by the 
highest authorities that it was Rev. Dr. Henry 
Duncan, another Scot, who first gave Savings Banks 
to England and to the world at large. And whence 
are drawn those rich and numerous donations for 
religious and benevolent purposes in England, dis- 
pensed by Miss Burdett Coutts? They come from 
the wealth of Thomas Coutts, an Edinburgh Scot. 
Sensible Englishmen do now=a=days revere Scotia 
in a way that would have astonished Dr. Johnson and 
Rev. Sidney Smith, as may be seen by such recent 
appointments in the English Church as the Rev. Dr. 
Tait to be Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Rev. 
Dr. Thomson, and the Rev. Dr. McLagan, in sue- 



178 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

cession, as Archbishops of York — their offices being 
next in social diginity to that of royalty itself; and 
we need scarcely mention, that, Scotchmen not infre- 
quently hold the very highest offices in the civil gov- 
ernment, the army, and the navy. 

If Scotland gave St. Patrick to Ireland — the 
founder under God, of the Irish Church; and gave 
also the linen trade, and the thrifty, industrious folks 
called the Scotch=Irish, then Ireland may well revere 
Scotia as we know she does. 

THE SCOT IN RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 

Russia, like other nations has been benefited by 
Scotch inventions, but has had long ago some special 
reasons for revering Scotia. The Diary of General 
Patrick Gordon, a cadet of Lord Aberdeen's family, 
shows that he was the familiar friend and adviser of 
Czar Peter the Great, that he was the leader of the 
ideas of the young Czar, and suggested and planned 
his policy towards Turkey — a policy which Peter's 
successors have pursued to this present day. It is 
believed that it was Lord Cathcart, who happened to 
be in Russia at the time of the French invasion, who 
suggested the burning of Moscow, an expedient, that 
saved Russia, and sent Napoleon Bonaparte home 
with the miserable remnant of 12,000 men of the 
500,000 with which he had left France on his Rus- 
sian expedition. Some Scots in various walks of life 
have been honoured in Russia, and some even in Tur- 
key, as the following anecdotes may show: 

" James Ferguson, the Scotsman, who entered the 
Russian service in the first part of the eighteenth 
century, was deputed at the end of the war with the 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 179 

Turks to treat of peace with the Turkish Grand 
Vizier. 

" The two officials met, with two interpreters, Rus- 
sian and Turkish, between them. Their business 
was satisfactorially conchided, and they arose to 
separate. General Ferguson, hat in hand, made his 
bow, and the vizier his salaam. Then the latter, the 
official part of the interview being at an end, 
turned suddenly, approached, and taking Ferguson 
warmly by the hand declared with a broad Scotch 
accent that it made him 'unco happy, noo that they 
were sae far frae liame to meet wi' a countryman in 
his exalted station.' 

" Ferguson stared with astonishment and the tur- 
baned vizier went on to exjplain — 

" 'My father was the bellman of Kirkcaldy in Fife, 
and I remember to have seen you and your brother 
occassionally passing.' 

" Another similar surprise, which was due to other 
causes, befell a Scotchman named Wallace, who, 
while travelling on the great plain that lies between 
the Sea of Azov and the Caspian, was astonished to 
find on his map a place marked ' Scottish Colony.' 
On making inquiries about it at Stavropol he was re- 
ferred to a venerable man with fine features, coal- 
black eyes, and long beard that would have done 
honour to a patriarch, who, in turn, asked him why he 
wished to know about it, 

'" Because,' said Wallace, 'I myself am a Scotch- 
man, and hope to find a fellow countryman there.' 

" His astonishment was extreme when the Circas- 
sian^seeming patriarch replied in genuine broad 
Scotch — 



180 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

'" O, man, I'm a Scotsman, tae; my name is John 
Abercombie,' 

''The explanation of this incongruous name and per- 
sonality was a simple one. In the first part of our cen- 
tury a band of Scotch missionaries went to Russia to 
convert the Circassian tribes, and received from the 
Emperor a grant of land on the frontier. Here they 
lived, and finding the older Circassians obdurate 
under their teachings, bought from them Circassian 
children that they might bring them up to the 
Christian faith." 

The Aberdeen Pasha. — There was, three years ago, 
in Kensington infirmary, says a correspondent of a 
contemporary, an old man of 90 years of age. For all 
the writer knows he may be there still, but he told him 
the following story. He is an engineer by trade and 
belongs to Glasgow. In the Iiusso=Turkish war he 
was chief engineer on a Turkish ironclad in the 
Danube. One day something had gone wrong with 
the machinery, and Hobart Pasha came on board. 
The engineer was busy with the repairs when he heard 
the voice of the admiral up on deck. The next minute 
he felt a slap on his shoulder, with an exclamation in 
guid braid Scotch. "Ye're makin' a fine job, my 
lad; it'll dae rale weel." "Guid preserve's a'," says 
the engineer, " whaur dae you come frae?" " Dod, 
man,'' says Hobart Pasha, "did you no' ken I belang 
to Aberdeen? Hobart's my surname, and after I cam* 
here they stuck on Pasha to mak' folk think I was a 
Turk." Toronto Empire, September 15, '93. 

Can the Chinese government cease to remember 
and respect the country of the late General Gordon 
who, simply with a baton in his hand, led on the gov- 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 181 

ernment army to victory after victory until a power- 
ful armed rebellion was crushed? The question was 
recently answered by China's greatest statesman, Li 
Hung Chang, jjlacing a wreath on Gordon's monu- 
ment, in St. Paul's Cathedral, London. Nor should 
China cease to revere the country of John Kenneth 
Mackenzie, who founded the first government Medical 
school in the Empire. 

THE SCOT IN INDIA. 

India greatly reveres auld Scotia, as the following 
item from a not very old paper proves: 

"At a meeting held in Bombay to commemorate the 
anniversary of St. Andrews's Day, Dr. Buist, who was 
one of the speakers showed how much India was in- 
debted to Scotchmen, stating that the ' Bombay 
Quarterly Review is chiefly written by Scotchmen, 
is printed by a Scotchman; and published by a 
Scotchman. The Bombay Gazette is conducted by a 
Scotchman; the Telegraph and Courier has, with 
one exception, always been conducted by Scotchmen, 
and is so still. He who does the Times is a Scotch- 
man — (laughter) — the Bombay Guardian and Orien- 
tal Christian Spectator were founded or conducted 
by Scotchmen. The Asiatic and Medical Societies 
are presided over by Scotchmen. The principals of 
both our colleges are Scotch, and some of the pro- 
fessors are Scotch: and those who have not been so 
favoured in their birth have wisely endeavoured to 
remedy the deficiency by marrying Scotch wives. 
(Laughter.) The Director of Public instruction is a 
Scotchman and so is the senior inspector of schools. 
Our Governor is a Scotchman, three of his personal 



182 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

staff are Scotch. Of the last ten governors who have 
presided over us, five have been Scotch, and for thirty 
years, out of sixty , Bombay has been blessed by a 
Scotch administration. We have a Scotchman at the 
head of the Commissariat, and another for his deputy' 
Our Quartermaster^General is a Scotchman, and 
BO is the Surgeon=General; while our Garrison Engi- 
neer, Civil Architect and Dockyard Engineer are all 
Scotch. It is quite clear that our noble army could 
neither be fed, physicked, or clothed, taken to the 
field, nor made comfortable in cantonments, except 
for Scotchmen." 

THE SCOT IN CANADA. 

Canada, even French " Lower Canada " as we used 
to call it, reveres Scotia, as may be seen by the promi- 
nent places in public life to which Scotchmen have 
been raised by their fellow citizens throughout the 
dominion. Thus the Toronto World speaking of the 
elevation of George Stephen to the peerage of Great 
Britain, under the title of Lord Mountstephen says, 
" He is the best representative of a class of men who 
have come to Canada and prospered. We mean those 
young Scotchmen who left their home in boyliood 
without other means than their native energy and in- 
trepidity, and who settled in Canada, engaging in 
commercial pursuits, and amassing, as a rule, large for- 
tunes. These are the kind of men wh omade Mon- 
treal, who made the bank of Montreal, who built the 
Canadian Pacific Railroad, who have succeeded all 
over Canada, and in India for that matter, in much 
the same way. Any one who knows Montreal, who 
knows Canada, can name these men by scores." 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 183 
SCOTCH EDUCATIONISTS IN CANADA. 

Passing over the names of the many Scots in Can- 
ada who are wealthy merchants, popular clergymen, 
clever lawyers, and distinguished judges; and passing 
over also a list 

" aa lang 's my arm" 

of the parliamentary Scots who have attained to the 
high political position of being honourables or sena- 
tors of the Dominion; let us just glance at the chief 
educationists,— the college professors and others 
throughout the Dominion, and we shall find that 
some of the most important colleges and universities 
have Scots at their head. Among the earliest of 
Canada's eminent educationists— the men who taught 
our clergy, lawyers, and judges in the higher branches 
of learning were Rev. Dr. Wilkie of Quebec, and Rev. 
Dr. Strachan of Toronto, afterwards Bishop of the 
Toronto Diocese. Sir Daniel Wilson is President of 
the Toronto University. Rev. Dr. George Munro 
Grant is Principal and Vice=Chancellor of Queen's 
University, Kingston. Sir William Dawson is Prin- 
cipal of McGill University, Montreal. Rev. Dr. 
James Ross is Principal of Dalhousie College, Hali- 
fax. And Rev. Dr. Alexander McKnight is Principal 
of the Presbyterian College in the same city. Rev. 
Dr. Willian Caven is Principal of Knox Presbyterian 
College, Toronto, and successor to the late Principal, 
Rev. Dr. Michael Willis. Rev. Dr. D. H. McVicar 
is Principal of the Presbyterian College, Montreal. 
Rev. Dr. George Douglas is President of the Metho- 
dist College, Montreal. The late Rev. Dr. Robert 
Alexander Fyfe was Principal of the Baptist Cana- 



184 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

dian Literary Institute, Woodstock. The Right 
Reverend Dr. John Cameron, Roman Catholic 
Bishop, is President of Arichat College. The Most 
Reverend Dr. Robert Machray, of the English Church, 
is Chancellor, Warden, and Professor of St. John's 
College, Winnipeg, Manitoba, and now Primate of 
all Canada: and the Rev. Dr. George Bryce is Head 
and Professor of Manitoba College. Then in the 
universities and colleges represented by these presi- 
dents and principals, and in other colleges of the 
Dominion, are many eminent Scotch professors, in 
various branches of science, too numerous to mention 
by name. 

THE SCOT IN THE UNITED STATES. 

And in the United States wherever Scotch- 
men retain their true national character they are re- 
spected, and are generally successful in social life. 
The Rev. Dr. Talmage who boasts of having a drop 
of Scotch blood in him, and who may be regarded as 
an authority in expressing the true American senti- 
ment on this subject, gave his testimony some years 
ago in the News of the Churches. Comparing and 
contrasting the different kinds of immigrants that 
land in the States, he says: " The Scotch come here 
with their honesty, their industry, their religion, 
their handicrafts, their Bibles, their love for the 
primer, the schoohmaster, the catechism, the Sabbath, 
the sanctuary, the ministry, to bless us. With rare 
exceptions they do well for themselves and for us." 
Mr. Andrew Carnegie may well be regarded as an- 
other authority in testifying to the respect in which 
Scotchmen are generally held in the States; for at a 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 185 

banquet held at Delmonico's, New York, an St. 
Andrew's Day, last year (1891), after giving the 
Scotchman credit for having •' a head that is practi- 
cal, shrewd, and calculating, but a heart that is full 
of poetry and sentiment; and a strong love for civil 
and religious liberty:" Mr. Carnegie then quoted 
from a standard American author, — Bancroft's "His- 
tory of the United States," that " The first voice for 
independence of the United States came not from 
the Puritans of New England, not from the Dutch of 
New York, not from the families of Virginia, but, 
from the Scotch Presbyterians of North Carolina. 
Another service of a Scotch- American was found 
when after Independence had been declared, and 
won in the field, a Constitution had to be drawn up 
for the country. That Constitution, the grandest 
political work ever conceived, was the production of 
Alexander Hamilton, a Scotch- American, and one of 
the greatest minds that ever figured in American 
history." 

But there are some other Scotch^ American names 
worthy of notice who signed the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, such as Philip Livingston, who took an 
active part in the Congressional business of the 
period, was one of the founders of the New York 
Society Library, and aided materially in establishing 
Columbia College. Kobert E. Livingston, of noble 
descent from Lord Linlithgow and the Earl of 
Wigton, and who was Chancellor of the State of New 
York, although not a signer of the Declaration, 
administered the oath of office to President George 
Washington, was appointed Minister to the Court of 
France, and greatly aided Fulton with his counsel 



186 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

and mpney in building the first steamer that plied on 
the Hudson River. Mr. James Wilson, a native 
Scot, was a signer of the Declaration: and was an 
active member of the Committee that framed the 
Federal Constitution. He was appointed by Presi- 
dent Washington one of the Judges of the Supreme 
Court of the United States. The Rev. Dr. Wither- 
spoon, a descendant of John Knox, was a native Scot, 
born at Yester, near Edinburgh. He signed the 
Declaration; and indeed, it is said, that he led the 
others, by his eloquence, to do so, when they were 
" switherin aboot it." He was called from his office 
as minister of the Kirk in Paisley, Scotland, to be 
President of Princeton College, New Jersey ; and the 
war having dispersed the college, he was for seven 
years a leading spirit in the United States Congress. 
In confirmation of what has been already said on 
this subject we may accept the testimony of that 
skeptical Frenchman, Max O'Rell, who has given far 
more study to national characteristics than he has 
given to the Bible and the Christian religion. In his 
book, "A Frenchman in America," he says: "The 
railway king in Wisconsin is a Scotchman. I was 
not surprised to hear it. The iron king in Pennsyl- 
vania is a Scotchman, Mr. Andrew Carnegie. The 
oil king of Ohio is a Scotchman, Mr. Alexander 
Mac Donald. The dry = goods-store king of New York 
— he is dead now — was a Scotchman, Mr. Stewart. It 
is just the same in Canada, just the same in Aus- 
tralia, and all over the English-speaking world. The 
Scotch are successful everywhere, and the new coun- 
tries offer them fields for their industry, their perse- 
verence, and their shrewdness. There you see them 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE W CIVILIZING THK WORLD 187 

landowners, directors of companies, at the head of 
all great enterprises. In the lower stations of life, 
thanks to their frugality and saving habits, you find 
them thriving everywhere. You go to the manufac- 
tory, you are told * that the foremen are Scotch.' " 

LOVE OF LIBERTY. 

Scots, like other nations have an innate love of 
liberty; but this has been intensified and inherited 
by the national history of Scotland which is a record 
of many long and victorious struggles against both 
ecclesiastical and civil tyranny. This fervid love of 
liberty is apt to degenerate into rudeness, unmanner- 
liness, and lawlessness if not controlled and guided by 
the reverential and refining influence of the Christian 
religion. But happily for Scotland that religion is, 
or was, influential and has saved her people from being 
numbered among the anarchists. Wherever Scotch- 
men go they carry with them the national ideal of 
Christian liberty, and intelligent notions of what 
constitutes national prosperity. For instance in 
England let the following item from the Scottish 
American of October 31, 1888 tell its own tale: 

" Seven Clever Scots.— The seven Scotchmen who, 
along with a citizen of the town, met in an upper 
room in Manchester and formed themselves into the 
Anti=Corn=Law League, were W. A. Cunningham, 
Edward Baxter, Andrew Dalziel, James Howie, James 
Leslie, Philip Thomson, and Archibald Prentice (Edi- 
tor of the Manchester Times, and author of the ' His- 
tory of the League') — all of whom were Scotchmen. 
Mr. William Kawson, a Manchester man and an Eng- 
lishman, was invited, but was unable to reach the place 



188 SCOTLAND'S SHAKE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

until the meeting had broken up; but he was' 
appointed treasurer of the league." 

As in England so in Canada, the United States, 
and wherever they are they are generally prominent 
as the reformers of public wrongs. See in Canada 
that plucky little man, William Lyon Mackenzie, 
who in fighting against the misgovernment of the 
country by a corrupt political clique, lost all, became 
a leader in rebellion and an outlaw, for whose head 
a large reward was offered; but whose political prin- 
ciples are now admired and acted upon by the most 
loyal and conservative of Canadian statesmen. 

See the Honourable George Brown, Editor of the 
Globe, for many long years the distinguished and 
almost worshipped leader of the reform party in the 
Dominion. As might be expected Scotchmen have 
done something on behalf of the enslaved negroes. 

Thomas Pringle, a Scot, a true poet, and coura- 
geous philanthropist after having seen the horrors of 
slavery in Africa, returned to England and became 
secretary to the Antislavery Society until its object 
was accomplished. 

See that magnificent specimen of a Scot — Zachary 
Macaulay, father of the degenerate Thomas Babbing- 
ton Macaulay the historian, Zachary grieved and 
disgusted with what he saw of slavery in Jamaica, 
resigns his lucrative office of manager of a large 
slave estate, and associates himself with such philan- 
thropic abolitionists as Granville, Sharpe, Wilber- 
force, and Thornton, in England, and finally be- 
comes the laborious governor, secretary, paymaster, 
judge, correspondent, and clerical substitute for 
preaching and marrying in Sierra Leone, the colony 



SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 189 

of liberated slaves, where he faces death itself on 
their behalf. Another instance of this Scottish love 
of liberty and fair play, is that of John Hossach who 
died last year (1891) at Ottawa, Illinois. The Scot- 
tish American Journal says of him, he "Was a 
Scotchman of whom his fellow countrymen in 
America may well be proud. He was full of the 
manly independence and love of liberty which char- 
acterize the true=hearted Scot, and was a strong 
friend of the down-trodden slave during the progress 
of the abolition movement. He had the practical 
charge of the 'underground railroad' in this state, 
and was a prominent figure in one of the most mem- 
orable trials which has taken place in the history of 
Illinois" He and Dr. Stout were tried for aiding 
the escape to Canada, of Jim Gray, a fugitive slave 
from Missouri; they were convicted, and fined one 
hundred dollars and costs, and sentenced to ten days 
in jail. We give here only the closing sentences of 
John Hossach's famous argumentative speech against 
slavery, addressed to Judge Drummond who sen- 
tenced him : — 

"My feelings are at my home," he said. "My 
wife and my children are dear to my heart, but, sir, 
I have counted the cost. I am ready to die, if need 
be, for the oppressed of my race, but slavery must 
die, and when my country shall have passed through 
the terrible conflict which the destruction of slavery 
must cost, and when the history of the great struggle 
shall be candidly written, the rescuers of Jim Gray 
will be considered as having done honour to God, to 
humanity, and to themselves. I am told there is no 
appeal from this court, yet I do appeal to the court 



190 SCOTLAND'S SHARE IN CIVILIZING THE WORLD 

of high heaven, where Judge Drummond and Judge 
Caton, the rescuer and the rescued, shall all have to 
stand at the judgment seat of the Most High," 

The speech produced a profound sensation, and 
was printed in full by all the leading papers in the 
North. 

Here ends our record of Scotland's character and 
her share in enlightening and civilizing the world. 
The record could be enlarged, but it need not be. 
Considering the smallness of the nation compared 
with others, her population being only about a sixth 
of that of England, her influence for good among 
the nations has been far beyond what might have 
been expected. Her worldly prosperity has been 
due, doubtless, to her characteristics of intelligence, 
industry, and perseverance, but not less to her gener- 
osity rewarded according to the divine promise, 
" Give and it shall be given unto you." 



